Unshore

It's very easy to lurch between moments of upbeat positivity about work in the environment and development sector, and moments of pessimism. There may simply be too many people trying to make a living in the world, too many on the edge of survival so that environmental sustainability is the last thing on their minds, and too much inequality that pushes the rich to get greedier and the poor to try and become rich.

There is also much criticism of the international aid/development sector for the way it fails to tackle problems, its poor value for how much it costs to maintain and the inequality between those working in it and the people it tries to 'help'.

Yet if the system isn't going to change any time soon, we may as well try and make the best of a bad situation. On this visit to a marine project there is much to be cheerful about even though the time needed to support a lasting change is overwhelming and the inherent destructive tendencies of humankind are cause for some despondency. Snapshots of hopefulness and achievement are there, wrapped up in issues such as government incompetence, pervasive lack of education and ability to cooperate, and completely different views on what would be termed 'success' or 'impact' between an illiterate Indonesian villager, government official or donor bureaucrat sitting in a European capital. Here we should persevere so that the donor investments to date are not wasted, and because the community perceives we are having a positive impact, which is backed up with evidence we have seen. That community support could be reason enough; it's more than many aid projects manage to secure.

Mixed musings on a beach in Indonesia. Which isn't a bad place to be having them.