|
In
the eighties of the last century, this wealth of built cultural
heritage was recognized by UNESCO (United Nations Educational,
Scientific and Cultural Organizations), which declared Shibam
and Zabid cities as world heritage cities. Since this time,
there have been many individual efforts and numerous projects
that have worked to preserve this rich built heritage. However,
even with these efforts many forces contribute to its deterioration
including: poor inhabitants, absentee landlords, rising costs
of maintenance and escalating real estate values. Other factors
that are endangering these structures and the traditional
crafts that created them, include new building techniques,
the quest for "modern" homes and a breakdown in
the system of guilds and the passing on of traditional crafts.
SFD's
Interventions in the Field of Cultural Heritage
Though cultural heritage is not a primary priority area for
the Social Fund, the unique and extraordinary importance that
characterizes Yemen's architectural heritage, in addition
to the considerable threats it faces, had lead SFD to intervene
and start activities in 1999. In the SFD's second phase, cultural
heritage was identified as a new sector within the community
development program and was allocated funds for further activities.
In its interventions. SFD targets public structures of significant
historic value with wider community and public value. Priority
is given to the most threatened sites or historic landmarks.
Due to the sensitivity and delicacy of such an area, SFD will
support pilot projects and preliminary steps before establishing
final detailed criteria for project selection.
Roads
Introduction
Yemen is a rural country of about 530,000 km2. 75% of the
population of 17 million reside in villages or clusters of
homes. 90% of the population is concentrated in mountainous
areas.
Agriculture is the major aspect of Yemen's economy and employs
about 60% of its labor force. The majority of agriculture
family-based substance farming. The highlands contain elaborately
built terraces of ancient origin that often extend from the
edge of wadis to the mountains tops. Agricultural output is
primarily qat, cereals, vegetables and fruits. Yemen's topography
and habitation patterns present challenges in establishing
a suitable road network providing access to the population.
Transport
Yemen's road network consists of about 70,000 km of roads
(6,200 km of asphalt roads, 2,900 km of gravel roads, 2,200
km of urban roads and around 60,000 km of feeder roads). Feeder
roads are tracks or earthen roads. Most of the feeder road
network was constructed during the 1970's and 1980's by Local
Development Associations.
Population
Yemen's 17 million people live in about 106,000 residential
groupings. Compared with other countries, this figure is extremely
high.
It
is evident that if all these groupings desire access to facilities
and services, the required road network will be enormous.
If the average access road length is only 5 km per residential
grouping, a total of 530,000 km of roads are needed. The existing
60,000 km of feeder roads would need to be expanded by 470,000
km.
Scope of Intervention
Projects to improve accessibility of rural or poor urban areas
and eligible for funding include:
 Constructing
feeder roads including the realignment of steep sections,
widening the carriageway, and construction of drainage structures
and protective works using labor-intensive techniques (small
bridges, drifts, Irish crossings, box culverts, retaining
walls, masonry ditches, etc.);
Improving
access to villages to facilitate the construction of other
village interventions (water supply, dams, health units)
by renting earth-moving equipment from local authorities
or the private sector, augmented with local labor in order
to increase the impact of the facilities provided;
Constructing
paved roads using rocks found in wadis. This is a well-established
technique for road construction in the Hadramawt region
executed by experienced construction crews coming mainly
from Tarim;
Improving
the surface layer of selected stretches of existing roads
using rock paving blocks or stones;
Constructing
stone pavement in market places and footpaths in urban areas.
Prioritization of Eligible Projects
Since SFD receives hundreds of requests for feeder road projects,
a selection tool was established in 2000 that is transparent,
accurate and fast. Furthermore, this tool allows an initial
screening of sub-projects without visiting the project area.
The following essential and easily verifiable criteria are
used:
Poverty
level of project area;
Population
benefiting (directly and indirectly);
Economic
capabilities of the beneficiary committees;
Access
to infrastructure (water supply, education, health);
Remoteness;
Suitability
as road network extension;
Per
capita cost (type of terrain, existing transport facility,
length).
|
|
|
