Resources

The DVD documents a PRA exercise which was carried out in a village in Karnataka in south India, facilitated by the NGO group MYRADA. The PRA started the process of developing an integrated plan for the watershed with the village community. The film focuses on the sequence and methods used during the PRA. The first activity was an ice-breaker and equaliser, where the outside participants attempted to perform routine village tasks (02). Next, seasonality diagramming provided information on rainfall, employment patterns for men and women, and patterns of income and expenditure (04). Watershed resource mapping and modelling (06) and transects then gave more detailed information about the watershed (07). At an evening group meeting the information which had been gathered was presented and discussed, with a focus on the major issues and how they were to be dealt with. The villagers decided that it was important to reforest the upper catchment to minimise erosion (12). A matrix ranking of local trees was then carried out to determine the use and importance of different species to the villagers (13). This provided the basis for deciding the mix of species for the reforestation plan. Time lines and venn (or 'chapati') diagrams of village institutions depicted the social environment of the village (16). Wealth ranking information was added to a social map (17). The PRA concluded with an evening social event for all the participants (20).

In 1994 an experiment on participatory monitoring was carried out with CCDBÆs PPRDP programme. CCDB is a medium sized Bangladeshi NGO that provides development assistance primarily geared towards women. The purpose of the experiment was to explore more innovative approaches to project monitoring away from more conventional approaches that emphasise the use of indicators. The experiment hoped to establish a more æiteratedÆ process or evolutionary approach to project evaluation. The approach sought to highlight differing perspectives and interpretation of project developments in order to learn from their experiences. Monitoring was undertaken by members of the CCDB programme, field level project staff, senior staff at the head office, and CCDB donors. Each of these groups were asked to identify and select on a monthly basis the most æsignificantÆ impacts or changes experienced under the programme and explain the basis of their selections; however, the structure of participation followed a hierarchical process of selection whereby the choices of participants were forwarded to higher levels of staff and finally to CCDB donors. In effect, the number of identified impacts eventually narrowed at each level of the organisational hierarchy. The first section of the paper outlines the methodology following a series of steps and then describes the state of the experimental monitoring system as of March 1995. It is then contrasted with other conventional approaches to monitoring. While the experimental monitoring system continues to be operational and CCDB staff have identified a wider range of objectives for the monitoring system, several weaknesses of the system are identified. Most significant among these is the tendency at all levels of staff to focus primarily on describing the æsignificantÆ project impacts, with less emphasis on elaborating their criteria for selecting those impacts. Also, project staff tended to report and select mostly positive impacts of the programmes, suggesting that the system biased against more critical reporting of events.

This report is of an RRA training workshop which was carried out in one of the pilot sites of the Bhutan-German Integrated Forest Management Project in Wangdi District, Bhutan, in 1995. The first part of the report outlines the purpose and approach of the different methods, and how they were used in the field. They included mapping, transects, semi-structured interviewing and focus group interviews, seasonal calendars, tree ranking, institutional diagramming, wealth/well-being ranking, 'vision-drawing' by children, and problem ranking. The results were then presented at a feedback meeting with municipality representatives. The second part of the report presents the findings of the RRA.

This paper describes how the combination of chemical soil and water analyses and PRA exercises were found to be complementary methods in assessing the magnitude of the pollution problem caused by the tannery industry in Kamtchipuram village, Tamil Nadu.

This paper discusses the importance of indigenous irrigation systems that have operated sustainably on indigenous technical knowledge that has ensured their longevity. Modern techniques have often ignored the importance of this knowledge and the role of such knowledge needs to be enhanced in the future.

Newsletter informing about World Neighbors' preliminary phase in the implementation of a community based natural resource management programme in Nusa Tenggara, Indonesia.