Development work in the post-COVID-19 era

COVID-19 has exacerbated the world’s socioeconomic situation. Now, the lives of the poor are more miserable and their livelihoods more uncertain. Globally, millions will become poorer. And millions more will become the new poor.

Foreign and local development organizations or non-government organizations (NGOs) working with governments have helped make the lives of the poor less miserable in normal and abnormal times. This has been the case since the 1944 Bretton Woods Conference, which ushered in development assistance. Thus, with their support, the poor have been able to overcome financial shocks in the aftermath of natural or man-made calamities.

But NGOs have yet to capitalize on this reality in establishing their core work. Instead, they hold on to their goal of helping the poor help themselves in their own development, a goal of which many have fallen short. Lasting or sustained improvements in the lives of the poor have yet to happen. History is witness to this. The development road in the NGO world is littered with rejected visions and missions, approaches, strategies, programs, projects, policies, advocacies, themes, systems, tools, methodologies, etc.

Most NGOs exist because of outside funding, for which they need the poor. In contrast, the poor will survive without NGOs. They know that in the end they have to strike out on their own. This is no truer now than with the COVID-19 pandemic.

Why not refocus then on the core work of mitigating the suffering of the poor? NGOs must adopt the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals as the global development template for what they do. This will lead to the formulation of an overarching goal statement on the mitigation of the adverse effects of poverty, discrimination, rights violations, disasters man-made and natural, etc. on the lives and livelihoods of the poor.

This will also put a stop to costly processes and activities with doubtful results and help streamline NGO work, leading to greater efficiency and effectiveness. No need for hierarchical goals and objectives and intricate results chains or theories of change at the program level and down the line. Fancy and costly academies, advocacies, workshops, webinars, etc. will be seen as negligible. Superfluous program and project documents and communication materials can be done away with—all of them unread and unused after some time, anyway.

Imagine the humongous savings in money, time, and energy for NGOs. Money that should go to regular programs for the poor, especially now that COVID-19 has presented immense new challenges.

Inevitably, NGOs must overhaul the whole gamut of planning, implementation, monitoring, and evaluation that has defined much of their work. They must align their streamlined program and project development and management activities with the appropriate core business process of mitigation, and work on new and better ways of implementation.

It’s time for NGOs the world over to stop once and for all this self-inflicted punishment, without compromising the quality and impact of their advocacies. This has become imperative in the face of the urgent, monumental challenges brought about by COVID-19, but pivoting to this new paradigm will also take place at a most opportune time.

It is certainly a huge challenge to sell this rethink to NGO honchos and decision makers, but one that must be done. Otherwise, it’d be business as usual in the NGO world in the post-COVID-19 era.

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Nono Felix worked for more than 10 years for an international NGO as corporate planning, monitoring, and evaluation manager for Asia. He covered Bangladesh, Cambodia, China, India, Indonesia, Laos, Nepal, Pakistan, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Timor Leste, and Vietnam. He lives in San Felipe, Naga City, Camarines Sur.