PRA and Community Mobilization

for
Community Based Watershed
Development planning
The community mobilization
process and its facilitation
Community Mobilization Process

 Community mobilization is a process through

which action is stipulated by a community
itself or by others that is planned, carried out,
and evaluated by a community
 It is a process which begins with a dialogue
among members of the community to
determine who, what and how issues are
decided, and to provide an avenue for
everyone to participate in decisions that affect
their lives.
Basic Requirements for Facilitating
the community mobilization
process
 The commitment and initiation of the
political leadership as well as the
participation of higher government officials.
 Suitable organizational structure for
community
 Engage them in a dialogue as to what?
Why? How?..... on different planning and
implementation process
 The roles of different actors in the
mobilization process:
 The communities- in: 
 Identifying problems
 Prioritizing problems
 Preparing & endorsing plan
 Delineating land
 Making ready the required materials and equipment
 Selecting technologies out of the alternatives
 Organizing themselves in work teams
 Implementation
 Monitoring & evaluation
The roles of different actors (cont.)

 Professionals
 Professional support during preparation and
endorsement of plans
 Facilitating conditions for the provision of alternative
technologies, materials & equipment supplies
 Designing systems for ensuring the participation of all
communities
 Providing training to development practitioners
 Preparing evaluation reports at different phases of
interventions
 The roles of different actors (cont.)

 Leadership Participation
 Organizing communities in groups and make them ready
for mobilization
 Making sure of the provision of materials & equipments
 Organizing committees for Monitoring & Evaluation
activities
 Conducting monitoring and evaluation
 Provide solutions for administrative problems
Summary
 Community mobilization needs continuous
efforts and dialogue on equal footing to know
more about the community
 It is a important tool to enable community to
use available resources for themselves
effectively
 While obtaining support from the community,
we should explore cooperation with outsiders.
Participatory Rural
Appraisal (PRA)
Participatory Rural
Appraisal
 Definition: A participatory research
technique used to plan and assess
development projects and programs.
 Enables “rural people to share, enhance,
and analyze their knowledge of life and
conditions, to plan and to act.”
(Chambers 1994:953)
 PRA Process and
Approach
1. Behaviors and attitudes of outsiders must
facilitate and not dominate.
2. Use methods that shift the normal balance
from closed to open, from individual to group,
from verbal to visual, and from measuring to
comparing.
3. Partnership and sharing of information,
experience, food and training, between
insiders and outsiders, and between
organizations.
PRA Tools & Techniques
 PRA methods comprise almost 40 different
tools. The most useful PRA "tools" are:
Direct observation Ranking & Scoring
Mapping Preference
Resource Pairwise
Social Matrix scoring
Historical Well-being
Diagramming Semi-Structured Interviewing
Seasonal calendar Key informant
Chapati /Vein Diagram Individuals
Pie charts Focus Group Discussions (FGD)
Transect
Historical/trend line
Daily routine profile
Livelihood analysis
1. Direct observation
  One of the most natural and logical ways to
gather information is by seeing for oneself.
 Can be followed by probing for more insight (A
"look and Listen Survey)
 Direct observation is especially important tool
during transect walk .
 2. Mapping and Modeling
How to Do Participatory Mapping
 Decide what sort of map you need.
 Social ( village residential areas)
 Natural resources( village land area)
 Watershed (forest, farm, etc.)
 Invite the villagers to attend a group meeting. be sure to invite people who have
information and are willing to share their knowledge .
 Choose a suitable place (ground, floor, or table) and media (chalk, sticks,
stones, paper, pencils, or pens).
 Help people started by letting them do it. be patient __'it's their map!'.
 Sit back and watch,.
 Keep a permanent record on paper, including mappers' names.
Advantages of Maps and Models
 Maps or models are used for identifying, presenting, checking, analyses,
planning, and motoring.
 They show quantities, size, and locations.
 Identification of vulnerable and disadvantaged groups
 Awareness and planning by the community
3 Transect Map/Diagram
How to Do a Transect
 Find local people who are knowledgeable, able, and willing
to walk and help.
 Discuss the aspects to be noted ( oils, trees, crops, etc.)
and approximate route (participatory mapping can help).
 Assign tasks in the team.
 Walk the transect. Choose a path that will take the group
through some of the diverse areas of the village.
 Observe, ask, listen ( don't lecture).
 Ask about and discuss problems and opportunities
 Note contrasts and changes, and identify zones.
 Ask someone from the group to make a transect diagram.
Example of Transect Walk Diagram
 4 Seasonal Diagramming and Analysis
How to Do Participatory Seasonal Analysis
 Decide whom you hope will share their knowledge (women men,
children, etc.)
 Find several people within this group who are able and willing to
participate. Explain what you would like to do.
 Find a suitable place (enough space, etc.)
 Ask when their year starts, names of divisions (months?
Seasons? etc.), and have them choose which division to use.
 Mark the time divisions on the ground/floor (use stones, chalk, etc)
 Within the time divisions, ask the participants to show important
aspects such as: rainy days, crop cycles, animal fodder
availability agriculture labor patterns, income accumulation,
migration, food availability (number of meals), illnesses, etc.
 Discuses probe, check: encourage debate.
 Record on paper, and share with others in the community.
 5 Chapati / Venn diagram
How to do Chapti/ vein diagramming
 Identify key informants or knowledgeable villagers who are willing and able to
participate in the preparation of the Venn diagram. Get good representation of
the villagers.
 Explain the purpose and objectives of the Venn diagram before starting. Brief
the villagers on how to prepare the Venn diagram, discuss Expected outcome
and its usage.
 Identify key organizations, institutions, groups or important individuals in the
village involved in decision making or having strong influence in the village.
 Identify the degree of importance, contact, and overlap between these
organizations, institutions, groups, or individuals.
 Get information from key informants, groups of villagers, and secondary data.
 Draw circles to represent each village institution, organization, or group (colors
can be used to represent different organizations, institutions, groups or
individuals). The size of the circle indicates importance or scope. The distance
of circle from the village indicates degree of importance of institutions,
organizations, groups or individuals to the village.
 At the end of the exercise, briefly discuss and analyze the results together with
villagers. Record the details of the exercise in a field notebook for future reference
 6 Trend Diagramming/ Analysis
Trends show
 Quantitative changes over time in visualized form
 Can be used for many variables, including: rainfall, depth of
water in wells, yields, population, area under cultivation/ land
use, prices, etc .
Diagrams and representations of trends can be shown
using:
 Pie diagrams on the ground
 Trend diagrams in a graph
 Quantification using seeds, stones, sticks, or numbers
 Physical indications in the field
 Maps and models
6 Trend Diagramming/ Analysis (cont)
How to do trend diagramming
 Discuss issues that people find important or that you want to
learn more about (time and distance to collect water, land use,
food/feed availability, rainfall pattern, etc.)
 Find one or more informants who know about past and present
conditions in the village and who are willing to share their
knowledge.
 Discuss the time period to be cover, and ask the participant to
pick out a few land mark dates( e.g, independence ...) These
dates conditions during one period against another time period.
 Let them decide how they would like to show the trends see
trend diagram .
 Discuss cross-checking of the information gathered. Who can
verify some of the information gathered and how?
 Record the information.
 7 Semi structured interviewing
SSI can be done with:
 Individuals for representative information
 Key informants for specialized information
 Groups for general community-level
information
 Focus groups to discuss a specific topic in detail
 How to undertake SSI?

 1. Prepare a checklist and guide questions for discussion and modify

it as new issues arise.
 2. Select individuals, key informants, interest groups for interview
(Get a good representation: spatial, gender, wealth class, etc.)
 3. Select time and location where to conduct SSI
 4. Observe proper interviewing techniques.
 5. Use the checklist and guide questions but allow flexibility.
 6. Probe (use relevant follow up questions as needed) and the Six
helpers : Who? When?, What?; Where?, Why?, How?
 7. Ask questions that are relevant to the villagers being interviewed.
 8. Use open-ended questions (not answerable by yes or no).
 9. Use visualization methods to enhance participation and dialogue
 10. Record the important points in each interview in a notebook.
Avoid the following Common errors
during interviewing
 Failing to listen closely
 Repeating questions
 Helping the informant by suggesting answers of
finishing statements
 Asking vague or insensitive questions
 Failing to probe
 Failing to judge answers ( Fact, Option, Rumor)
 Asking leading questions
 Allowing the interview to go on far too long
 8. Ranking & Scoring
 Ranking or scoring means identifying people's priorities with
regard to problems, needs, or potential.
 In NRM, for example, ranking and scoring have been used to
compare and contrast effectiveness of different types of SWC,
importance of different tree species, etc.
 Ranking allows the main problems, needs, constraints, and
preferences of individuals or groups to be determined and
enabled the priorities of different people to be easily compared.
 Helps to clarify community members' preferences and constraints.
 Enables the community members to discuss, analyze and
priorities their problems, needs and possible solutions.
 Matrix ranking and scoring are very useful for the analytical
process because of values placed on non- tangible as well as
physical elements.
 How to carry out ranking
 First, ask a sub -group member to list issues, problems
which have already been mentioned before (e.g. during
resource mapping, making a historical profile etc.)
 Ask the whole group if they have any additions to made to
the list,
 Ask them to attribute some symbol (s) to each problem, to
ensure that even the illiterates can understand the list.
 Let them collect material for scoring (which they find
suitable). For example stones or seeds.
 Ask the group to rank their priority issues, importance of
resources, problems, etc. This could be done by using
either: Preference ranking or pair-wise ranking as well as
with matrix scoring.
Group Exercise on Ranking
1. List issues, or problems which already you
know and do Preference Ranking
2. List issues, or problems which already you
know and do Pair-Wise Ranking
3. List issues, or problems which already you
know and rank using Matrix Scoring
 How to do Preference ranking
 Give each person a certain number of seeds and ask
them to place as many seeds they want to problem(s)
they find most important,
 Tell them they are free to place the seeds wherever they
want.
 If somebody considers only one problem to be
important, he/she could put all stones against is specific
one.
 If there are several pressing problems the amount of
stones could be divided b/n them
 Ask people why they chose the ranked order to
understand the rationale of the issue and the rank.
 How to do pair-wise ranking
 1. Ask the villagers to identify and prepare a list of issues (i.e.
problems) to be ranked.
 2 Prepare a matrix on a large sheet of paper or blackboard. Indicate the
issues on the top left side of the matrix.
 3. To get the villagers’ preferences (through voting), facilitate the
comparison of issues with one another. The first issue listed on the left
side of the matrix will be compared with all the issues listed on the top.
(Repeat the process until all the issues have been covered.)
 4. Note (write down) the number of times each problem was preferred.
Make a summary of the preferences and rank them accordingly.
 5. Encourage discussions while the exercise is being conducted to
enhance probing and cross checking of information. Ask the villagers’
reasons for their choices and note these reasons.
 6. Give enough time to villagers to discuss. Do not rush the exercise.
 7 At the end of the exercise, briefly discuss, analyze, and summarize
the results together with villagers.
How to do Matrix scoring
 Place the listed problems in the first row on the top of a matrix.
 Motivate the group to find criteria according to which they can
differentiate the problems.
 List the criteria developed from/with the villagers on the left side of the
matrix (see example below).
 Continue until there is no new criterion regarding any of the problems.
 To avoid confusion, make sure that all the criteria are expressed either
in a negative of in a positive way.
 Choose the method for scoring or ranking that suits to the participants.
 Tell the sub-group to distribute the seeds along the row.
 Add extra criteria if participants find it difficult to make a choice.
 Encourage participants to revise sections, if necessary because of
new arguments.
 Prioritization (Ranking) of the
Problems Using Matrix Scoring
What is the Who Proportion (%) Importance of Severity Frequency Arithmetic Consensus
problem identified? of the the problem to [3=high; of occurrence importance Ranking
exactly? community livelihoods 2=medium; (%) [multiply all]
affected [3=high; 1=low]
1=low]
Proportional piling & Wellbeing Ranking
  Proportional pie and bar diagrams are useful to quantify proportions of a
whole, particularly where absolute values of the whole may be difficult to
calculate- such as
 Household income and expenditure
 Where participants may be unwilling to give quantities (e.g. numbers of
livestock owned).
 To group community members into different categories of wellbeing
(Wellbeing Ranking )
 Some criteria/indicators used to determine wealth/ wellbeing are:
 land size, livestock holding,
 quality of house/shelter, housing materials,
 number of children,
 access to credit,
 level of education
 Wealth ranking is extremely useful for targeting beneficiaries of a
program.
Other tools and techniques of PRA
 Daily routine diagram/ activity profile
 To collect and analyze information on the daily patterns of
activities for different groups of people (for example women,
men, old, young,) and seasonal changes in these patterns
 Livelihood analysis
 To interpret the behavior, decisions, and copying strategies of
households with different socio-economic characteristics.
 Variables for a livelihood analysis may include: household size
and composition, number of labor migrants in the household,
livestock and land ownership, proportion of income by source,
expenditure, seasonality, relation of income, credit and debt.
THE COMMUNITY ACTION PLAN (CAP) & PW
Purpose of the CAP
 The CAP is a PRA tool which should be used by the community to
summaries what they intend to do to solve their problems
 The CAP is not a shopping list. It has to insure that all activities, which
the community can do with its own resources, are actually done by the
community itself. Possible contributions by development agencies
should only be considered for such activities which the community is
not able to do.)
 The community is fully responsible for producing a CAP and for
implementing it. The community can appoint a committee to take over
this responsibility.
 The CAP should be seen as a tool, which ensures that the community
is the owner of the project and is fully responsible for its planning,
implementation and success.
 .
Format for a community action Plan (CAP)

 1. Name of the project

 2. Responsibly for the project
  3. Rationale of the project( why has the project
been given priority by the community?
 4. The communities vision of the project
( objectives)
  4.1 What are the goals of the project and who will
benefit from reaching these goals?
 Activities (Steps) to produce the
outputs
Outputs Activities responsibility

1 1. Water point get constructed. 1.1 Select site for water point with the Community/ DO
interested households.

1.2 Ask for assistance of construction Community

materials not locally available.

1.3 Collect locally available materials Community

1.4 Transport construction materials DO/ Community

1.5 Ask for assistance of skilled labor for Community

construction.

1.5 Execute the construction Community/ Skilled labor

Material (inputs) needed to do
the activities
Activities for which inputs are needed Material and /or equipment needed Source

1.2 Ask for assistance of construction materials  Cement, Iron sheet, -- DO

not locally available.

1.3 Collect locally available materials  Stone, sand, --- Community

2.1 --------  -------- ----------

2.3 --------  --------

2.3 --------  --------

Good Luck!

Thank you!!!