South
Korea is wooing Kenya to adopt an economic growth programme designed to
fight poverty starting form village-driven economic initiatives without
‘waiting for the government or foreign aid.’
The approach named Saemaul Undong,
a Korean word for village movement, is credited for South Korea’s
growth from a poor nation in the 1950-1970s to an economic giant today.
It
involves villagers taking personal initiatives to initiate projects
with the little resources they have with the government only coming in
to boost their progress as opposed to the norm where citizens look up to
the government for help.
Last month, Korea Saemaul
Undong Center president SO, Jin Kwang, visited Kenya to share the Korean
experiences with village leaders from a Karai village in Kiambu where a
similar programme is starting.
The Korean leader urged
Kenyans to take up the Model as it has a proven past of creating a
bottom –up approach for economic development.
“Kenya
was much better than Korea until Mid-70s and this is the secret behind
the rapid growth we have experienced; you have to start with what you
have first and create change in your immediate environment.
Burundi
and Uganda where poverty is worse than here have both began the plan
with good progress there. It take diligence, cooperation and self-help
to achieve great progress and that is why am here to inspire you to take
up the spirit of Saemaul Undong,” Mr Kwang said.
Korea
is seeking to spread the gospel of rural -first -driven development to
other countries across the globe including Asia, Africa and Latin
America with over 60,000 leaders from 150 countries trained on the
concept.
Liberate the poor
SMU
is acclaimed as Korean –type economic and societal development model
that seeks to liberate the poor from donor mentalities to self-reliance
and self-initiated economic growth.
About 20 Kenyan
village leaders from various counties have been trained in South Korea
with the plan targeting to train more and create real time economic
growth from the bottom. In Uganda, 80 villages have begun the plan after
191 leaders were trained in Seoul.
The economic model
started by former Korean President Park Chung-hee in 1970. He was the
father to the current (11th) and first female president of South Korea.
It
was conceived following extreme poverty in the villages despite
economic growth in the urban areas as the country industrialised.
After
establishing the rural development plan, the government created a
competition between villages and gave rewards to the best performing
villages. Villagers would wake up early to participate in drainage
construction, roads expansion, housing projects and digging of water
wells.
The government then gave 33,267 villages 335
sacks of cement for free and allowed them to plan and decide what they
would do with the cement as long as they did not use them for individual
gains. A year later, results of project evaluation was done and best
performing ones received 500 bags of cement and one tonne of steel.
Others were rewarded according to how they had performed.
After
working well in rural areas, the phenomenon was spread to the urban
areas and cities where people worked to foster decent society with
public etiquette, public manners, awareness and environmental
preservation.
Saemaul Undong later became a grassroots
movement and has been applied in dealing with social issues and national
development. It has since became a ‘pride of Korea’ hence the latest
clamour to spread it to other countries.
“You have to
take up this ‘I can do it spirit’ and decide your own destiny without
waiting for the government to come first. Your effort is enough and the
government only comes after you have begun and you take total charge of
the economic future. You must be morally fit and own every process
because that is the spirit of Saemaul Undong,” Mr Jin Kwang said.
The
rural areas in Kenya host the bottom economic segment of the population
with the World Bank estimating that they form the bottom 40 per cent of
the population-where majority of Kenyans are found.
Apart from eliminating the ‘serikali saidia’
(we are calling upon the government) mentality, the plan also creates
strong community ties and can be instrumental in building cohesion
between communities apart from driving economic growth.
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