PALESTINIANS ANSWER "NO" TO QUESTION, "ARE YOU

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 TEL AVIV 001909 SIPDIS NEA FOR SATTERFIELD E.O. 12958: DECL: 05/29/2004 TAGS: ECON EAID SOCI ISRAELI PALESTINIAN AFFAIRS ECONOMY AND FINANCE SUBJECT: PALESTINIANS ANSWER "NO" TO QUESTION, "ARE YOU BETTER OFF?" Classified By: Economic Counselor Ted Mann per 1.4 b and d This cable is a joint message from Embassy Tel Aviv and Consulate General Jerusalem. This cable is confidential until publication of World Bank Quarterly update. ¶1. (C) Summary: Starting in October 2003, the World Bank and Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics (PCBS) have conducted a series of monthly surveys to measure Palestinian attitudes and expectations concerning their economic and humanitarian circumstances. An average of 1253 households and 517 businesses have been surveyed over the four months. The most recent survey results available are from January 3 - 26, ¶2004. An advance copy of the January results show that Palestinians continue to view each month as "worse" than the previous month. Despite this history, they do not expect conditions to deteriorate further, but nor do they expect them to improve. Mobility restrictions remain much more pronounced in the West Bank (WB) than in Gaza and have a differentiated impact in both WB and Gaza. For example, access to elementary school remains good in both WB/G, but access to one's workplace can be more problematic. Palestinian households continue to report that on an individual level, the most pressing need is for food assistance. However, their aspiration for their community is for more job creation. Only 14 percent of respondents over the four months said they are aware of donor projects to address their communities' needs. Business owners continue to have a conservative outlook on the future, anticipating no new hiring, no capital investments, and no increased revenues in the near term, leading the World Bank to question the prospects of future economic growth. End Summary. -------------- Quality of Life -------------- ¶2. (C) Over the past four months, Palestinian households have consistently reported that their overall "quality of life" deteriorated from the previous month. Despite this negative trend, respondents have remained neutral or slightly optimistic about the future. When asked to look forward one month, respondents expected life to be either "unchanged" or "somewhat better." Jerusalem residents are the most negative in assessing their current situation relative to the previous month and also the most pessimistic in expectations of future improvements. In the West Bank and Gaza, there has been a strong correlation between the assessment of the overall quality of life and the degree of Israeli military intervention in the area during the particular reporting period. -------------- Movement Restrictions -------------- ¶3. (C) West Bank households reported an improvement in mobility between October and November 2003, but no improvements since. It is important to note that in each of the four months, over 50 percent of the West Bank respondents reported that their mobility was restricted "a lot". In Gaza, on average 30 percent of the respondents said their mobility was restricted "a lot." Mobility restrictions have not had a universal impact. Respondents were asked about their ability to access schools, health care, place of employment, and agricultural land. For the most part, respondents said their children in both WB and Gaza are able to attend elementary and secondary schools without difficulty. Accessing university, which often requires some travel, is more problematic, but still does not pose overwhelming difficulties for most respondents. ¶4. (C) In Gaza, respondents reported few difficulties in accessing health care facilities. In the WB, the results are mixed, with residents of Hebron and West Bank villages reporting the most difficulty in the January survey. Residents of West Bank refugee camps reported the fewest problems, most likely due to the existence of UNRWA clinics within the camps. Concerning access to employment, Gazan households reported that they have between "few" and "no" problems accessing their workplaces. In the West Bank, the average fell between "few problems" and "difficult" and varied greatly by governant. For example, in Nablus fully 35 percent of those with/with jobs said it was "very difficult" or "impossible" to reach their workplace in the January survey. In the WB, there has been a slightly positive trend regarding access to agricultural land over the past four months. In Gaza, however, the trend has been negative. -------------- Expect to get a job? -------------- ¶5. (C) In January's survey 26 percent of the WB and 28 percent of Gaza respondents had no/no employed persons in their households during the previous week working either full time or part time. At the same time 57 percent of the WB and 60 percent of the Gaza households reported that they had no family members that were unemployed. Asked about expectations of finding work in the next month and over the next six months, both WB and Gaza unemployed were neutral saying they were "neither optimistic nor pessimistic". These neutral expectations have been consistent for all four months of the survey. If, however, the unemployed knew the replies given by business owners, perhaps they would be more pessimistic. For all four months, both WB and Gazan business owners said they did not anticipate hiring new staff in the following month. Asked to project out six months, most WB employers still predicted that the employment levels in their companies would be "unchanged." Gazan businesses owners were slightly more optimistic about increasing hiring in October and November 2003, but in the December and January surveys, they too said that six months hence they expected their employment levels to be "unchanged." -------------- I Need Food; My community needs employment -------------- ¶6. (C) Throughout the Intifada the international community has struggled to find the right balance between humanitarian responses and long-term development needs. The World Bank surveys pose several questions related to this debate and asks participants to rank their most pressing needs as a household and as a community. At the household level, food assistance was the need most often selected - it was both the number one ranked need (selected by roughly one-third of households each month) as well as the item most included among household's ranking of their top five needs. However at the community level, job creation was the most perceived need, selected by a plurality in the WB and an absolute majority in Gaza. Public infrastructure was second to job creation and selected as the number one community need by roughly one fourth of households in both WB and Gaza. These rankings and shares have remained consistent over the course of the four monthly surveys. Household Number One Need - West Bank/Gaza (January Survey) Food 35% / 32% Clothing 0% / 1% Education 8% / 9% Employment 16% / 25% Financial Assistance 26% / 19% Health 8% / 5% Housing 6% / 7% Community Number One Need - West Bank/Gaza (January Survey) Employment 45% / 57% Health 13% / 5% Food 6% / 5% Education 4% / 5% *Public Infrastructure 25% / 26% No Needs 7% / 1% * Asked what type of infrastructure they required, Gaza residents chose sewage/wastewater disposal as their number one need, with roads second. West Bankers were evenly split between roads, health facilities, and sewage/wastewater disposal. In both West Bank and Gaza, answers varied widely based on the prevailing conditions within a locality. -------------- Most do not know donors exist -------------- ¶7. (C) Only 14 percent of households in Gaza and WB said they were aware of donor financed projects designed to satisfy their communities' priority needs. Those households who were aware of donor efforts generally expressed "moderate" levels of satisfaction with donor projects. (Comment: The largest donor contribution - USD 230 million in 2003 in PA budgetary support - may be invisible to the average household. End Comment.) -------------- Pal private sector says don't count on me -------------- ¶8. (C) Asked about the overall business environment and their establishments' sales, employment levels, profits, and costs, business owners/managers continue to report that the current period represents a deterioration from the previous month. In January's survey, WB business managers in Qalqilya governate reported the greatest deterioration relative to the previous month; while in Gaza, Rafah establishments reported the greatest decline. Looking forward, businessmen in WB and Gaza remain neutral, saying they do not expect their overall condition to change in the next month. Specifically they said they did not anticipate increased sales, capital expenditures, or employment within the next month, nor within the next year. All of these indicators led the World Bank to conclude the "modest economic recovery witnessed in 2003 may have been more along the lines of a partial rebound from the severe negative shock of 2002. But going forward, economic growth will be tentative at best, and vulnerable to reversal." -------------- Comment -------------- ¶9. (C) The fact that for each of the four months Palestinians have identified food as their most pressing need is an indicator of just how bad the economic and humanitarian situation is in the territories. The assessment that each month is worse than the last suggests that Palestinians are not perceiving any benefit from intermittent Israeli initiatives to improve humanitarian conditions. It is worrisome that that only 14 percent of respondents said they were aware of donor projects and suggests that the donor community needs to do more to publicize its efforts. Looking forward, it remains clear that economic and humanitarian conditions will remain dismal absent progress on the political/security agenda that would enable greater private sector investment and an increased donor focus on long-term development needs. End Comment. ********************************************* ******************** Visit Embassy Tel Aviv's Classified Website: http://www.state.sgov.gov/p/nea/telaviv You can also access this site through the State Department's Classified SIPRNET website. ********************************************* ******************** KURTZER