Scoones, I.

The paper reports on the use of wealth ranking in an agro-pastoral community in Mazvihwa communal area in southern Zimbabwe. A comparison of the rankings carried out by different groups reveals differing perceptions of what constitutes 'wealth', and highlights the need to carry out several different rankings in order to explore the diversity of local perceptions. The rankings were also examined in relation to household survey data of asset ownership and income levels.

Abstractor - please leave note at end (Also in English see record no. 1992)

A comprehensive guide designed for both new and experienced trainers in training others in the use of participatory methods. (Also in Spanish see record no. 4059)

This guide for trainers emphasises facilitating the self-development of trainees to enhance their learning. Games and exercises are used to provide a mix of learning environments. This handbook gives details on how to conduct over 40 such exercises. Particular attention is given to training in semi-structured interviewing, participatory diagramming, and in ranking and scoring techniques. Other sections discuss the facilitator's role, games and exercises for strengthening groups, drama and role playing, and organisation of training workshops.

This training workshop in Zimbabwe was attended by staff of a community management of woodland project. These included village based researchers (VBRs) and community workers (CWs), who it was intended would gain experience of participatory research techniques for use in community planning and project evaluation by communities involved. The report outlines the woodland project, the roles of (VBRs) and (CWs) in decision making about tree resource management, and discusses issues of community acceptance of local research, and information biases in previous research activities.

This is a readable guide to the use of diagrams in RRA and PRA. Chapter 1 discusses the value of diagrams, compares diagramming with other methods and cautions how diagrams may be misunderstood. Chapter 2 gives hints ('do's' and 'don'ts') on diagramming, rapid assessment of diagrams and on the logistics and practicalities of the process.

Semi-structured interviewing (SSI) is guided interviewing where only the topics are predetermined, and questions arise during the interview. Using a guide or checklist, the multidisciplinary team poses open-ended questions and probes topics as they arise. New avenues of questioning are pursued as the interview develops. This handbook introduces interviewing as a research method (ch.

The first part of the article explores ten of the myths about PRA - for example, that it is quick, easy, that people involved are neutral, that it is not political - and attempts to debunk them. The second part discusses the relationship between anthropology and PRA and what they have to offer each other. It is concluded that PRA needs anthropology to continue the process of reflection, self-critique and theoretical and methodological enrichment. Conversely, anthropology needs an applied context to work effectively and make the most of the discipline's insights.

This short paper reports on the use of browse ranking in southern Zimbabwe. Two types of ranking were conducted. First, a simple scoring of a list of all available trees in the area was carried out. The results showed that the livestock owners' rankings tallied closely with quality assessments based on chemical analysis. Next, a more focused matrix ranking explored a few key species against a range of criteria. In terms of overall preference, early shooting was the most important criterion, followed by the importance of dry leaves as fodder.

The approach reported on by this paper uses the perceptions of informants to rank households within a village or quarter of a village according to overall wealth. The example comes from a RRA conducted in a village in the Sudan. Also, preference and direct matrix rankings used to investigate local incentives to tree management near Khartoum are reported. In the latter, two techniques were used: pair-wise preference ranking and direct matrix ranking.