Quite often I tell stories about the lighter things that
happen in overseas development work. One
about the “Dartford Warbler” two weeks ago produced the same response from the
listener as many before him. “You should
write it up!” So this is the
idea for this series of anecdotes.
Dartford Warbler |
Or Alnwickdotes! I will admit to drawing on the ingenuity of
whoever at the Duchess’s High School in Alnwick coined the phrase Alnwickist for their newspaper. Now most people may not know that our town’s
name of Alnwick is spelt with two silent letters – the ‘l’ and the ‘w”,
phonetically we say “Annick”. So
now you see the play on words. There’s a
student revolutionary in all of us. Mine
goes back to the campaign against UK Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher, then
Education Secretary, who made the harsh decision to end free school milk to pupils.
Returning to the Dartford Warbler, in 2006, we all had to convene as the various country
representatives of Ockenden International with HQ management in Dubai to
hear of the dire impact the Dartford Warbler was having on all of us, our work,
and the organization. Ockenden was
operating programmes to assist refugees and displaced people in many of the world’s
trouble-spots. What or who was the
Dartford Warbler? It was not some
newspaper critic against Ockenden. It
was and is a humble and endangered bird.
A village-based self-help group formed by Ockenden International in Cambodia 2005
Ockenden International has a fascinating origin and story,
told in its current website Ockenden Prizes
and in the booklet shown above. Now although its work was generously funded by
donors such as DfID and the European Commission, it had to find and make
co-funding contributions. Over the years
that contribution came from legacies.
People enthralled by founder Joyce Pearce’s and Ockenden’s work kindly
bequeathed property. Gradually these properties were sold off until there were
just one or two remaining near Woking here home. (The Woking Library houses a collection on Joyce.) However one of the two propeerties was to fetch a good price to keep us going for several years - until the Dartford Warbler made its
call. Or to be exact a conservation
order affected properties within a distance of the breeding sites of our little
friend. So the sale was delayed indefinitely, with no new revenue in the
foreseeable future. We had no choice but
to close our country programmes, except in Cambodia, we were fortunate. We were able to continue it as Ockenden Cambodia www.ockendencambodia.org. an independent
local organization. For the full story, please connect to Ockenden and Cambodians Part 1 and Part 2.
For those of you who follow my views about
“aid and development”, you will know that I think all international agencies
and organizations should have clear exit strategies, to hand over to people
within developing countries, who are usually able and most entitled to devise their own
solutions. As Journalist SebastianStrangio
commented “Self-obsolescence can be
very elusive” in the aid industry. What we did with Ockenden Cambodia proves
that it can be done and be “sustainable” in development jargon. Yes, some of us are masochists to do ourselves out of our jobs!
The good
news, however, is that the Dartford Warbler did not lead to the total demise of
Ockenden entirely. In fact, having
solved the property sale issue, Ockenden has been re-born and revitalized as an
innovative donor, still championing the original cause of refugees and disabled
people. Last week, its latest award to a
worthy cause was made. The Most Reverend & Right Honorable Dr John Sentamu,
Archbishop of York, presented the prize to “Twunganire Abahungutse (TA) -
Everyone Supports Returnees” of Burundi.
Congratulations to all concerned, and long may the Dartford
Warbler warble!
2017 Update.
This year's Ockenden Prizes award can be accessed here.
2017 Update.
This year's Ockenden Prizes award can be accessed here.
2021 Update
I am glad to know of growing interest in how we "localised" Ockenden from an international NGO to a genuine local one in Cambodia. It has not only survived but done well now for over 13 years on its own. You can access the original article here that sparked the debate.
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