Sector Post-Conflict Reconstruction and Peacebuilding Project Type Urgent Rehabilitation Planning and Quick Impact Projects Project Title Urgent Rehabilitation Support Programme in Afghanistan (URSP) Location Kabul, Kandahar, and Mazar e Sharif, Afghanistan Client Government of Afghanistan/ JICA Project Period 2002 – 2006 Before (2002) and after (2005) of the project in Kandahar Problems addressed by the Project Kabul, Kandahar and Mazar e Sharif were battlefields of the civil war. Significant needs of post-conflict Afghanistan were normalization of civilian life and rehabilitation of social infrastructure including health and education facilities, roads and wells. In education, there was limited opportunity for girls to go to school although parents wished their daughters to go to girls’ school, and the female enrolment rate was only 13% (in Kandahar province). Also, acute respiratory infection (ARI) caused by dust from unpaved roads and preventable communicable diseases such as tuberculosis were serious issues. Lack of baseline data and information concerning people’s needs was a significant obstacle for conducting support programs. In addition, although there were huge needs for a seamless transition from humanitarian relief to development, the international community tended to concentrate only on humanitarian relief activities. The Government of Japan decided to proceed with Urgent Rehabilitation Support Programme (URSP) to improve the life of war-affected civilians and to stabilize regional security conditions through the reconstruction of damaged infrastructures and by technical cooperation to the people. Service Provided OC Global responded to fill the gap between relief and development through planning activities for rehabilitation of cities and construction management works for quick impact projects. Starting in April 2002, OC Global deployed more than 50 specialists to conduct sector analyses of the post-conflict situation in Kabul and Kandahar. Through the process of quick reconnaissance surveys, OC Global identified significant rehabilitation needs. Quick impact projects, known as “Urgent Rehabilitation Project,” were planned by us soon after the arrival of the consulting team, and construction management work followed immediately after the planning. OC Global started to implement projects to pave city roads in order to reduce dust, and to reconstruct primary and secondary schools to enhance education opportunity for both boys and girls. To insure sustainability, OC Global focused both on school buildings and human resources. In Kabul, OC Global organized teacher training programs for head teachers to improve their capacity to utilize the rehabilitated school facilities. In addition, OC Global prepared rehabilitation strategies/plans and priority project lists for reconstruction of the cities through discussions and consultations with local governmental institutions, UN agencies, and NGOs. The urgent rehabilitation program in Kandahar, for instance, included 26 high priority projects covering various sectors such as education, health, water and sanitation, urban and regional development, women’s empowerment, and security. OC Global organized stakeholder meetings with local government institutions, UN agencies, and NGOs to discuss implementation and cooperation of urgent rehabilitation programs in the future. It was the first opportunity for all stakeholders to have met together in one place in Kandahar. Some of the priority projects were implemented immediately after the meeting in cooperation with the stakeholders.