As part of the UNICEF relief programme to Angola, a technical team carried out a ranking exercise upon which this paper reports. It took place between December 1991 and June 1992. Ranking is defined here as a process of priority ordering, in this case administrative areas in relation to the need for assistance. It used the knowledge that informants possessed from the country, at a national level, as well as from the provinces. No quantitative data were used. The ranking technique was expected to provide a rational framework to deal with time and resource constraints. The paper looks at the ranking process at a central and provincial level, as well as looking at the limitations and potential of the approach. It concludes that ranking was useful with regards to outlining the humanitarian issues in Angola; however, its efficiency depends very much on the choice of information source.
This paper presents some basic challenges faced by ZOA-Refugee Care, an international Christian NGO, in Rwanda in recent years. The organisation has been working in the post-1994 genocide and war period to provide emergency aid, and now increasingly focuses on community development work. The paper reports on the background of the project, issues around institutional environment and organisation change of ZOA-Rwanda, notes from the PRA sessions held, and follow-up processes. Along with specific recommendations, it is seen that the decentralisation policy of the Rwandan government offers a good opportunity for a participatory approach, particularly as local authorities have a large impact on the progress of a development programme and are crucial to inducing change.
Reflections around the tensions between male fieldworkers and Women's Project Officers on an Oxfam project, lead to the idea that RRA training can help to raise gender awareness. The RRA approach encourages fieldworkers to listen, to see that communities are not "homogenous blobs" and to abandon preconceived ideas. A case-study from Sierra Leone shows how a social map drawing activity done separately by men and women revealed their different perceptions and needs. The second case-study shows how RRA work in Ghana caused male fieldworkers to change their views of women's position in the community. The next most important step would be to "transform fieldworkers' anger and resentment into positive pride in their awareness of difference".
This is abstracted in the annotated bibliography Famine Early Warning and Food Information Systems in the Sahel and Horn of Africa, Lambert et al, 1991, IDS Development Bibliography, no. 7.
Nutritional surveillance, as part of, or complementary to, the famine early warning system in Ethiopia, has been used to collect reports on local food security from community leaders using structured interviews. It is important to assess the extent to which this information reflects the food-related behaviour of the community. Information on various socio-economic variables related to nutrition was collected at the household and community level through interviews in western Shewa Province. The data was compared and generally the correspondence between the two was good. Information topics which might be missed using only the local leader, and ways to improve collection are discussed.
Rapid Food Security Assessments (RFSA) are especially useful for determining the causes, dimensions and characteristics of the food security situation in a given area. They are a type of Rapid Rural Appraisal and are particularly good for identifying the most food insecure groups in a given area and the causes and magnitude of the food security situation. The targeting and timing of a RFSA will be triggered by an early warning system already in place in a region susceptible to food shortages. The general procedure followed in most assessments involves: reviewing secondary data to familiarize the team with the sociocultural, econmomic, and ecological attributes of the area, open-ended interview guides to ensure that pertinent issues are covered, and group, household and key informant interviews to gather information about the local situation. RFSAs use other RRA techniques such as maps, diagrams and ranking exercises to elicit a local perspective on resources, constraints, wealth distribution and seasonal trends. Upon completion of a survey, contingency plans should be drawn up to link information to response.
SCF(UK) established a local food security monitoring project called SADS in the Mopti region of Mali, which has been operational since 1987. It aimed to identify who was vulnerable, where, when and why, and to provide appropriate information to decision makers. This working paper describes some of the lessons learnt from the experience of monitoring food security and coping strategies. Information was collected by field staff from rural people, and this paper examines the use of such qualitative and semi-quantitative data, and the problems associated with using local knowledge systems. The approach to data collection belongs loosely to that associated with RRA. Information was collected by project staff using checklists and semi-structured interviews with key informants, listening to oral histories and discussions at village meetings. SADS also uses sentinel sites called 'listening posts' which are located in positions to gain insight into larger areas. Information was collected on agricultural and fish production, on-farm stocks, off-farm employment, consumption and migration. This was supplemented by secondary data, particularly on rainfall. Seasonal calendars were drawn up to show food access, activities and coping strategies for different producer groups, and this has led to the use of seasonally specific monitoring indicators. SADS shows that a relatively low cost methodology for monitoring food security can be established, based mainly on socio-economic data, that can provide timely and reliable warnings of localised food insecurity.
Information collected during emergencies often does not identify accurately either the population in greatest need or the relative amounts of relief assistance required. Needs appraisal models are required in which data collection and analysis is rapid. This paper presents a case study of a disaster relief project in Highland Guatemala which sought to provide a database which relief organisations could use to target assistance. A brief introduction to target assistance. A brief introduction to the existing conditions in Guatemala is presented, followed by a description of the assessment techniques used. Initially, the two main techniques used to obtain quantitative and qualitative data were an observational checklist and key informant questionnaires. The paper concludes with a discussion of the findings and impacts of the study.
This reports on ActionAid's project aimed at strengthening emergency preparedness and responses in famine vulnerable areas in a number of African countries. It examines the setting up of Community Based Food Security Monitoring Systems (CBMS) that help field staff make timely predictions about impending food shortages. One of the principles of a CBMS is that it is 'people-centred', and the community should be involved with data collection, interpretation and response. The aim is to build up a picture of the way peoples' livelihoods operate and what constraints and stresses they face. To assess the food security situation, PRA techniques are used including semi-structured interviews with key informants and group discussions with farmers and village leaders. PRA is also used to collect data on early warning indicators. The paper comments however that it is best not to take a full community-managed approach in circumstances where a number of participatory prerequisites are not in place.
The Ogaden Needs Assessment Study was undertaken as a joint exercise between SCF(UK) and the Pastoral Surveillance Team of the RRC Early Warning and Planning Services. The trigger for the study was the influx into the Ogaden of thousands of returnees from Somalia and concern about capacity of the region to support the growing population. A rural sample survey was carried out using two helicopters. The objective was to establish the nutritional status of children and also to get data on grain production, consumption, sale and exchange, and the prospects of the food economy. The health data was obtained using standard anthropometric procedures, while socio-economic data was gathered by the use of questionnaires on key informants. The survey showed that the combined effects of the collapse of the livestock/grain trade and the continuing burden of the returnee population could result in a food crisis during the following dry season.
The bulk of the document concentrates on indicators of malnutrition, famine and the ability of early warning predictors. The relationship between famine and nutrition is discussed. There is a section which deals with methodology of assesment, and is split between formal, qualitative data collection and quantitative assesments, predominantly RRA and PRA. The applications and analysis of quantitative data are discussed, with many of the criticisms of qualitative work being outlined, and a combination with quantitative work suggested.
This paper describes a game and a story that were presented during the workshop to show how PRA can "help people to address and resolve conflict". The TASO game (described in the appendix) was used to illustrate current HIV transmission rates in Uganda. The story showed how PRA exercises conducted by Redd Barna in Zimbabwe brought out women's and men's different views of a proposed irrigation scheme. The potential for PRA to help resolve such conflicts is the emphasis placed on "the value of good communication skills". Development workers need to learn "facilitation and arbitration skills" in order to deal with, rather than "glossing over" conflict and "failing to acknowledge the political dimensions to all our interventions". Psychological stress (particularly in relation to HIV and AIDS) also needs to be recognised as "a valid development issue".
A two-year project investigated modes of conflict management in a pastoral society in north-western Kenya, and tried to find causes for successful or non-successful (that is, non-violent or violent) conflict behaviour. PRA methods were used in an effort to speed up the normally lengthy process of obtaining data on conflict management. The study found that internal conflict was managed fairly successfully despite being thoroughly informal. This stood in sharp contrast to violent inter-ethnic conflicts. The reasons for these differences were many and complex. The paper concludes that although an appreciable amount of descriptive data may be gathered by using PRA methods, they are more limited when it comes to identifying the causes of conflict behaviour.
Thousands of farmers who sought refuge in urban centres during the ten-year civil war in Mozambique are now returning to their farms. In response to this changing situation, VetAid, a UK-based NGO, is planning a community restocking programme. PRA methods were used to gather information on the socio-economic, ecological and political conditions in the villages. This information was then used help design a restocking programme appropriate to the needs of the community. The article describes some of the methods which were used, which included wealth ranking, informal interviews, matrix ranking, diagrams and historical transects.
This ten-minute video was made by Manor Street Community Group in North Belfast, Northern Ireland with the help of students from King Alfred's College. Manor Street is situated in the heart of an area divided by religious and political conflict. The film focuses on efforts by the Community Group to get support from the community and funding for a new Community Centre. After a 3-year public consultation period plans for the centre were drawn up and the City Council was approached for funding to build and run it (00). There was a great need for the centre. Since a wall had been built between the warring catholic and protestant communities shops had closed and buses stopped running (01). There was nothing for young people to do and vandalism was common (02). The problems had been exacerbated by the loss of the old centre and its youth club. All community spirit had gone from the area and the lack of opportunity for protestants and catholics to meet meant the two communities were even more divided (04). The Community Group made contact with various bodies to obtain support and funding. Discussions with residents made it clear that people wanted a centre which would provide something for all ages (05). One person suggested that keep fit classes for women could help deal with stress. The Centre would help put the heart back into the area by providing the community with a focal point and a morale booster (06). The plans provided space for a creche as well as rooms for meetings and classes for the unemployed (08.30). Volunteers from the community were sought to fundraise, run activities and join the management committee (09). The aim was to encourage the whole community to join in.