“Give me the money that has been spent in war and I will clothe every man, woman, and child in an attire of which kings and queens will be proud,” said 19th century US senator and anti-slave leader Charles Sumner in reference to the US Civil War. His words have lost no salience since. The war in Iraq, for instance, has cost US tax payers at least $3 trillion according to research conducted by the former chief economist at the World Bank, Joseph E. Stiglitz. That’s enough money to put a lot of shirts on a lot of backs.
In Lebanon, war has become somewhat of a national sport pitting the interests of regional and global players against each other in a seemingly endless saga of death and destruction. Indeed, the latest episode of Lebanon’s war saga that took place in 2006 between Israel and Hizbullah proved no different, leaving dead around 1,200 Lebanese dead — mostly civilians — and 160 Israelis, mostly soldiers. Human suffering aside, Lebanon’s Council for Development and Reconstruction (CDR) estimated that the total material cost of the war stood at $3.6 billion.
Lebanon’s many needy
What was unique about the 2006 conflict, however, was the speed and magnitude of international humanitarian assistance in the form of funding that poured into Lebanon upon the cessation of hostilities. A host of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) have since moved in to provide the humanitarian relief and development assistance needed for the country to recover from the conflict. Furthermore, the Nahr el Bared conflict in 2007 between the Lebanese army and the Fatah al-Islam militant organization kept the focus on Lebanon in terms of funding for humanitarian assistance. The Italian Government alone has committed over $217 million towards emergency relief and infrastructure in Lebanon since the 2006 war.
Today, however, Lebanon enjoys relative political stability, with Merril Lynch estimating 2009 growth at 2.7 percent, while most of the countries that have pledged money towards humanitarian efforts in the country are contracting. “The global financial crisis has affected humanitarian work around the globe. Countries worldwide have to make reductions and external elements are an obvious selection,” says Christina Bennike, Lebanon country program manager at the Mines Advisory Group (MAG), a British mine clearance organization.
Additionally, the transient nature of humanitarian work entails a specific work model that comes in three stages: the emergency phase (during and directly after a conflict or natural disaster), the post-war construction and capacity building phase and, finally, the development phase characterized by long, drawn out funding cycles. This natural progression also brings with it funding constraints that complicate the budgets of humanitarian organizations operating in Lebanon.
“Funding for projects during the crisis period could typically be expedited in around three months as opposed to the time it takes today which can be up to a year,” says Wolfgang Hager, EU senior policy adviser to the Lebanese Government. “Projects are now moving into more of a maintenance phase.”
As such, most revenue streams flowing into Lebanon for emergency and construction phases are expected to dry up by the end of this year. “The final phase of financing for our emergency program will [go from] 2009 until 2010 and I don’t think we continue with financing after that,” says Fabio Melloni, director of the Italian development cooperation office, the humanitarian and development arm of the Italian government.
“Usually when you have a crisis situation in any country you have a lot of international NGOs and donors that will come in and give a lot of money to handle emergency relief issues and then all of a sudden they leave,” adds Ghassan Makarem, editor and media coordinator at Lebanon Support, an organization that coordinates humanitarian efforts in Lebanon. “People already got their money for the first part of 2009. The problems will start when they apply for funding for 2010 or late 2009.”
Time to tighten the belt
As the cash flow of large donors becomes increasingly restricted, humanitarian relief organizations and some NGOs are feeling the crunch.
“This year we are getting half the budget we received last year, for projects of a similar nature [sic],” said a senior director of a European NGO, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Sarah Shouman, country director at Search for Common Ground, says “there is definitely going to be an effect on NGO funding and donors will be a lot more stringent on their regulations as to how they give out funding. Everyone is going to feel that and be taken aback.”
On some levels the lack of funding has already begun to materialize through the scaling down of projects essential to the well-being and development of the Lebanese population. Two of the seven international mine clearing organizations in the country have already shut down due to a lack of funding and it seems likely others will follow.
“Last year we had 22 [mine clearing] teams; at the beginning of this year we had 18 and now we are down to 15. We stand to loose more than half of our teams,” says Bennike. “The more we reduce teams the less likely there will be a handover of land, which is going to impede economic recovery, the construction of villages and homes as well as increase civilian casualties.”
As if that wasn’t enough, another natural element of the humanitarian sector is to move with the tide of wars and natural disasters. “Unfortunately, with the NGO game wherever the need is; you have to rush there,” says Shouman. Ergo, the recent Israeli onslaught on Gaza is expected to deplete the already skeletal coffers of large donors like the EU and the US. To some extent this transference of priorities has already begun to materialize. On February 18, the EU announced in a joint statement that it will grant the UN agency for Palestinian refugees (UNRWA) a further $51 million to meet humanitarian needs in the Gaza Strip.
Naturally, the combination of these factors has begun to affect Lebanon’s real economy as many people who were employed in these organizations are either on the verge of being unemployed or have already been handed a pink slip.
“The [number of] jobs will drop with the money,” explains Makarem. “There have been situations where all of a sudden you have all of the men in a village… unemployed.” Also complementary businesses stand to suffer once their cash cows leave Lebanon for greener pastures. “It’s over for the suppliers and some of them know it, but there is nothing they can do about it,” adds Makarem.
All in all, it looks like the party is over for the humanitarian sector in Lebanon. Most of what’s left to do inside the country will either be completed by the end of this year or pan out across several years and funding cycles before eventually being handed over to local partners and the Lebanese government. What remains to be seen is whether Lebanon’s government and civil society can shed their sectarian pretensions, step up to the plate and help themselves instead of having others do it for them.
Israel’s recent gaza onslaught is expected to deplete the coffers of donors like the U.S and E.U.
