The Nation October 28 1998

We may divide the various types of non-governmental organisation (NGO) network into four groups for ease of explanation.

These are the ''hot-issue'' group, the ''cold-issue'' group, the Assembly of the Poor and the pro-civil-society group.

The hot-issue group works on selected cases, for example pollution, nuclear power, industry and dams. Protests are the usual activity of this group to demand and if possible extract a solution from the authorities.

The cold-issue group deals with general issues like women, children, consumers, green products, health, community-based savings and environmental awareness. It normally avoids confrontation.

The Assembly of the Poor, established in Dec 1995, works on six problems affecting 121 groups of poor people from 35 provinces concerning land rights, the negative impact of dam construction, slums, occupational health, the results of government development projects and farming issues.

The assembly's aim is to get government compensation for errors in past development policies and to suggest changes. Pressuring the government in any form to resolve all 121 issues is its main activity. This usually ends up with with negotiation or scrutiny by ad-hoc committees.

The main activity of the assembly is similar to that of the first group, protest. Last year saw its longest protest, lasting 99 days.

The last group, the pro-civil-society group, was formed after the drafting of the Eighth National Economic and Social Development Plan. This group believes that national administration at all levels should draw on a partnership of five sectors ( the ''penta-party''): government, business, communities, academia and non-governmental organisations.

This group is supported by many well-known figures, such as Prof Prawes Wasi, Magsaysay Award Winner Sophon Suphaphong, Anek Nakhabutr and others, who support the Eighth Plan. It is the only group which approves of the Social Investment Loan from the World Bank and Asian Development Bank in the present economic crisis. This group is striving to create a civil society in over 20 provinces outside Bangkok. Another characteristic of it is to avoid hot issues.

In the near future the hot-issue group should find its proper niche in society criticising development projects emanating from centralised administration and supervised by bureaucrats.

This will focus on controversial projects such as the projected nuclear-research reactor, the gas pipeline under construction as part of the Malaysian-Thai Joint Development Area project, the Southern Seaboard Development Scheme package, the commercial-forestry plan and others of a similar cast.

The Assembly of the Poor will continue to press the claims of its constituents and may well bring about changes such as getting alternative agriculture written into ministerial policy or the community-forest concept into law.

The pro-civil-society group will have a significant role working with government and other sectors, including business. Its aim of seting up a penta-party forum at every administrative level, especially provincial, may effect a compromise and achieve some of the goals of its networks, which now exist in over 20 provinces.

The LDI, which has played a significant role for decades in pushing community-based development through NGOs-COD (NGOs-Coordinating on Development), will be one important leader of the pro-civil-society group under the leadership of Dr Sa-nguan Nittayaramphong.

The pro-civil-society group will also receive great support from the recent Magsaysay Award Winner Sophon Suphaphong, who has given a great fillip to community business.

Meanwhile the cold-issue group will continue on its quiet way. Health care and children's issues could surge to the forefront here because of the current economic crisis.

Two obvious challenges to the NGO movement are how to solve its budget problem and how to sustain the direction of its work.

Finance is a problem for all four groups. The foreign donors who were the main source of their budgets for three decades are falling away, diverting their attention to less developed countries which have not enjoyed the growing affluence Thailand has had in the past 10 years. The present economic crisis excites little long-term sympathy, though as much money as ever is derived from foreign governments, especially in Europe.

The Danish Cooperative for the Environment and Development (Danced) and other European government sources will continue to be the main source of financing for Thai NGOs, according to many NGO officials.

However, these funding agencies tend to support only projects dealing with natural-resource management rooted in local wisdom, so it would be fair to say that this could be one prominent trend in Thai NGOs in the years to come.

The least cash-strapped is the pro-civil-society group owing to its good relations with government agencies which control financial resources.

This group is the only one which has accepted loans from the World Bank and Asian Development Bank designed to ease the social problems consequent upon the economic crisis. The other three groups have refused to have anything to do with these loans, claiming that the source of the money is in conflict with their principles.

Domestic financing from sources such as the Green Fund, initiated under the 1992 Environment Act and administrated by the Science Ministry, is not expected by any of the four groups to be a panacea for their money troubles: bureaucracy and red tape make it difficult for NGOs to meet the conditions for this, for most NGOs want cash with the minimum of strings attached. Negotiations continue between Green Fund officials and NGO representatives with little prospect of a satisfactory conclusion.

Some NGOs, like Sa-nguan's LDI, do not worry over-much about finance. The trend, Sa-nguan says, is for NGOs to spend less themselves and be more of a ''catalyst'' for the people's movement.

The Wildlife Fund Thailand (WFT), which has begun to take a more hot-issue approach in for instance its opposition to the gas-pipeline construction, admits that financial concerns are increasingly hampering its work.

WFT would like to rely financially more on the general public than on foreign sources, as it did initially, since it prefers to be independent of international wildlife organisations and preserve its own distinct character, says WFT vice president Dr Suraphol Duangkhae.

''We never used to set much store by domestic funding, but we will now,'' says Suraphon. ''It's a challenge for us, for if the public turns against us we shall find ourselves short of money, let alone moral support, whereas if they give us their money, however little, it means they approve of what we are doing.''

Most NGO representatives from all four groups agree that the biggest challenge to NGOs at the moment is to figure out how to face the particular social and economic changes brought about by the economic crisis, and that includes funding and developing their own human resources.