Seven Steps
for Achieving Effective, Community-Led, Demand-Driven Development
How does the ADF's
model for achieving effective, community-led, demand-driven
participatory development work? The following narrative details the
seven steps that the Bady pilot project created to ensure direct
community ownership of rural development from start to finish.
The
ADF Approach to Participatory Development in Guinea
1. Community Survey
ADF's Guinea
team began its work on behalf of the PACV by meeting with local
community leaders in the three CRDs where the Foundation agreed to
serve as both a donor and field operator. The team met with local
village leaders to explain the overall goals of the PACV; determine
what other development activities were ongoing in the area; describe
the role of the CRD as a decentralized, local development agency;
and conduct an initial assessment of local needs and opportunities.
These meetings also introduced the concept of local “community
development agents” – trained Guinean discussion facilitators who
spoke the languages of the region and possessed experience in
implementing participatory development methods. It was explained
that community development agents would help local villages organize
their discussions of development priorities.
2. Community Mobilization
Following the
community survey, the ADF team organized general assemblies in
participating villages where all segments of the community were
invited to be present. (In some cases, ADF organized smaller
villages and hamlets together as a single assembly so that outlying
residents would have an equal opportunity to participate in the
decision-making process.) These village-level meetings described the
PACV program to all community members and presented a plan for
facilitating broad discussion of development needs through the
formation of separate discussion groups based on age, gender, and
other social categories. The assemblies debated how to organize
their groups fairly and then assigned residents to each group. Each
village created at least three separate groups for men, women, and
youth, while some villages created additional groupings for the
elderly or for different occupational groups.
3. Needs Analysis
Once the various
discussion groups were formed, the community development agents
conducted focus group exercises with each of the designated
groups. Because most adults in rural Guinea are not
literate, the community development agents introduced communication
tools that do not require formal reading comprehension – visual
aids, charts and mapping exercises - to ensure broad and active participation. The focus
groups gave women, children, and other individuals who are normally
excluded from community decision-making a direct say on critical
issues, and each group voted on its
development priorities and elected a delegation to present those
priorities at a general village meeting.
Click here to view a diagram
that details the decentralized decision-making process that drives
Guinea's Village Support Program.
4. Community Action Plan Development
At the village
meeting, group representatives presented the issues
that their meetings had identified and debated their merits. These
meetings often produced coalitions of interest that tested
established pathways of authority and produced unexpected results.
For example, women and youth frequently voted together on
development issues, pressuring adult men and established village
leaders to amend their own list of priorities. The community forums
ultimately facilitated consensus, however, by providing an
opportunity for open debate and careful negotiation.
After approving
its community development priorities, each village sent a delegation
– typically consisting of two men and two women – to a sub-district
assembly of several village delegations. The sub-district assembly
discussed local development needs at a broader level and debated
which development priorities were most pressing across the
sub-district’s villages. The sub-district meeting then
elected a cross-section of delegates to
represent its development needs at a general assembly of the entire
Rural Development Community (CRD).
Delegates to the
CRD assembly subsequently put together a detailed four-year
community action plan for the district as a whole and presented it
to the PACV program for approval and funding authorization.
5. Training and Capacity Building
Once the CRD-level
assembly approved its community development action plan, ADF’s
Guinea field staff began working with local community leadership
teams to train them in financial management, help them design
workable plans for managing construction,
and help them negotiate protocols for project implementation. These
protocols included clear rules for community oversight of local leadership teams and rules for the recruitment of local labor and
materials. The capacity-building activities helped
produce the local knowledge and skills required for community-led
development while ensuring continued investment of local communities
in the process.
6. Implementation, Monitoring, and
Remediation
Project
implementation – the actual brick-and-mortar construction of
schools, health clinics, and community wells – provided the ultimate
test of ADF’s participatory development methods in Guinea. By
investing in strategies that engage communities as authors and
owners of the development process, ADF helped guarantee
local investment in outcomes. And by equipping village development
teams with financial training and management skills, ADF provided
local communities with the tools they needed to solicit and hire
building contractors, draw up construction schedules, process
purchase orders, procure voluntary labor, and secure local
collection of sand, stone and other materials. (Each community
contributed 15 percent of the estimated cost of construction through
donations of labor and materials valued at 10 percent of total costs
plus a five percent donation in cash.) The end result was the
timely completion of projects without significant conflicts or
delays in payment. Village representatives utilized newly acquired
financial skills and their training in contract negotiation to
resolve disputes with contractors and prevent misallocation. Regular
community meetings ensured accountability and transparency
throughout the building process.
7. Evaluation and Follow Up
ADF has helped
ensure the sustainability of local development initiatives by
working with villages to evaluate ongoing needs and create
maintenance committees, health committees, and school parents’
associations that govern the upkeep and administration of new
community resources. Today, seven years after the start of the Bady
project, health committees and parents’ committees organize the
periodic repair and cleaning of facilities. They play an active role
in selecting which medicines to stock at the local clinic and the
number of students to be enrolled in each grade. They work with
teachers and health agents to support adult literacy classes and
midwife training sessions. ADF’s commitment to capacity building
through participatory development has thus produced a measurable,
long-term impact in rural communities across Guinea.
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