Social Impact Assessment of Infrastructure projects in Nepal

1. Social Impact Assessment
(SIA)
Tools and Techniques in SIA for
Infrastructure Development
Projects

2. SIA: Setting the Scene
• SIA emerged as a field of social science during 1960s –
realized EIA inadequate for addressing social issue.
• Since 1970s adopted SIA for addressing social impacts.
• For resettlement projects, SIA has evolved basically-
– To identify project-affected people
– To find measures to mitigate negative impacts, and
– To compensate irreversible losses following a
participatory process

3. SIA Activities
• Identify affected parties,
• Facilitate and Coordinate participation of stakeholders,
• Collect baseline data,
• Provide an in depth review of the local cultural contexts,
• Predicts likely impacts and how stakeholders will respond,
• Assist in evaluating alternatives,
• Assist in site selection,

4. Cont…
• Recommend mitigation measures
• Develop coping strategies to deal with non-
mitigatable impacts,
• Advise on appropriate institutional and
coordination arrangements for all parties, and
• Assist in devising an d implementing monitoring
and management programs.

5. Managing Impacts
• Avoid
• Minimize
• Mitigate

6. What is SIA?
SIA is a process of identifying:
• Intended and unintended Social impacts(+ & -) of
Planned interventions,
• Social change processes invoked by those
interventions, and
• In an infrastructure projects, SIA determines
whether a RESETTLEMENT ACTION PLAN is
required.

7. Means/Process of SIA
• Social Screening,
• Consultation Meeting with stakeholders,
• Cadastral Survey

8. Categories of Social Impacts
• Household Assets (land, house, trees & animals),
• Access to common property resources,
• Livelihood (way of subsistence, culture and
relations),
• Local economy

9. Conti…
• Cultural Resources (tangible and intangible),
• Social Capital (mutual help, institutions),
• Vulnerability (Exclusion).

10. Type of Impacts
Direct Resettlement and livelihood restoratioon
Indirect Induce Mitigation and change in local
economy/ecosystem,
Permanent Land acquisition and Discipline,
Temporary Noise during project constructions
Physical Housing & land loss
Economic Jobs: business.

11. Timing of Impacts
• Project Designing
• Project Construction
• Project Operations

12. SIA Building Blocks
• Baseline,
• Alternative Analysis for Site,
• Define ZOI
• Consultation Process
• Identify Cultural Resources
• Identification of Vulnerable People/Groups
• Identification of PAPs and SPAPs
• Socio-economic Profile of SPAPS
• Stakeholders Identification

13. 1. Baselines
• Define the Pre-project situation
• Each project will require different
information (baseline), depending on
expected impacts,
• Number of beneficiary population (district,
VDC, Project area)

14. Baseline Cont…
• Possible positive and negative impacts of
the project,
• Other related information.

15. 2. Social Screening (SS)
• Project preview (short note)
• Number of beneficiary population (ZoI),
• Number of affected people (direct and
indirect)
• Identification of SPAP and PAP

16. SS cont…
• Identification of legal owners, squatters or
encroachers, and other category of land
tenure arrangements,
• Key economic indicators on local
economy and HHs,
• Severity of impacts on land, structures and
common property

17. 3. Cadastral Survey
• Identification of actual land donors (title
holders),
• Identification of non-title holders,
• Initiation of land ownership transfer
process

18. The 5 Ws of SIA
• Why?: Manage Risks & Mitigate Impacts
• Where?: Project area of influence
• When?: As early as possible.
• Who?: Directly affected people & other
stakeholders, and
• What?: Negative Impacts and opportunities.

19. Activities of SIA
• Identify affected people/parties
• Facilitate & coordinate participation of
stakeholders
• Collect baseline data
• Provide an in depth review of local cultural
contexts.

20. Activities of SIA Cont…
• Recommend appropriate mitigation measures,
• Assist in site selection,
• Assist in evaluating alternatives
• Predicts likely impacts and how stakeholders
respond,

21. Activities of SIA Cont…
• Develop coping strategies to deal with
non-mitigatable impacts
• Recommend appropriate institutional and
coordinate arrangements for all parties,
• Assist in developing & implementing
monitoring and management programs.

22. Alternative Analysis
• Compare different options to achieve the
same goal
• Compare impacts (social, economic and
environmental and so on)
• It is a key tool to minimize negative
impacts and maximize positive impacts.

23. Definition of Area of Impacts
• Identification of project area and ZoI
Project
•Direct impact area
•Indirect impact area

24. Vulnerable People
• Project influence is not equally distributed
to all in a given population
• Gender, ethnicity, age, economic variables
may determine different degree of impacts
• Poverty lines may help in determining
vulnerable people

25. SIA Methods
• Socio-economic survey,
• Land tenure surveys & mapping exercise,
• Focus groups discussions,
• Key informants interviews, and
• Analysis of secondary information

26. Socio-Economic Profile
• Profile of livelihood losers,
• Profile (hh) of SPAPs, and
• Other related information as require by the
project.

27. Cultural Resources
• Physical cultural resources
 Burial places
 Worshiping places and
 Sacred forest and locations.

28. Cultural Resource Cont…
• Intangible cultural resources
 Customs,
 Ritual Practices
 Sense of attachment to place

29. Structure of SIA Report
• Executive summary,
• Background
• Description of the project
• Methodology
• Stakeholders analysis & cunsultations
• Analysis of Impacts (direct & indirect)
• Alternative analysis
• Socio-economic profile of ZoI
• Other related data, maps, documents and so on.