V - Guidelines - Recommendations - Conclusions
According to the terms of reference, all proposals are relevant to the present situation of the Project and concern the actual phase of the FAO Project.
1 - Integration of gender activities in natural resources management programmes
Integration and linkages of women's activities in natural resources management programmes are essential according to the nature of the FAO Project. Two conditions are necessary:
- pilot villages for gender activities can be chosen according to the location (in the vicinity of forests and/or range lands), the dependency of the local populations on natural resources and sylvo-pastoral / users' organization activities carried out or in progress to be carried out by the Project:
- support of gender activities will be linked with women's involvement in activities concerning the use of natural resources (range lands, forests water) This will be one part of the partnership contract negotiated between the populations and the Project. Women are the firs' users of water and wood for example, and are often responsible for the animal feeding. included grazing. Awareness programmes should be developed on these activities and integrated in vocational training courses package given by extensionists. Women should be involved in improved range lands and fodder shrubs plantations trials and demonstrations. ID some remote villages, where fuel wood is the only available source of combustible (like Ayn Jourin in Syria), improved ovens could be experimented. Women could also be involved in forests thinning programmes in order to use cut wood for charcoal making.
The support of the Project for activities regarding the priority needs of women should allow their better receptiveness to the importance of natural resource conservation in addition, the support to women organization through group promotion and leadership capacity building may be an advantage for group activities regarding natural resources. For example groups constituted from common interests (like income generating activity) could be targeted better than individuals to experiment organizations of grazing lands users.
2 - Elaboration of local development programmes and partnership agreements
Until now most of Participatory Rural Appraisal methods to identify problems and solutions were carried out with men. Although it seems important to include representative women in these firs. meetings, it should be followed by a specific gender programme to be elaborated by women's community in collaboration with the Project. The identification of the problems is generally the first step and it is essential that representatives of all socioeconomic groups of women attend the meetings. In fact women's community is not homogeneous and the problems are different according to the status, age, educational level, livelihood and living standards, etc. From this stage groups who have common problems and common interests can be identified and constituted through the methods of group's promotion.
Local programmes should integrate the different scales of times even if the emergency of immediate problems prompts the population to emphasize court term strategies. The approaches should take in account the short, medium and long term. This presupposes that the next step, after the identification of the problems, should be the initial diagnosis and the analysis of external and internal causes. This task should be undertaken in close collaboration between women and the Project and needs skilled staff according to the importance of the quality of this diagnosis. In fact it will be the starting point to identify immediate and short-term actions, suitable to solve priority problems, and consequently to give credibility to the undertaken approach. The implementation of this first short term programme allows the reinforcement of the local thoughts and the definitions of long term orientations. from where a medium term programme can be deducted. Consequently, natural resources programmes can be taken into account by the grass Toots providing they are integrated in a local development programme.
The local development programme will be elaborated in close collaboration between women's community (and their groups' representatives) and the Project and will include the nature of the actions to be undertaken, their planning, the obligations of each partner (technical and financial) as well as the expected results.
3 - Main areas of support: extension. capacity building. organization. IGAs
The lack of technical assistance in agricultural and livestock raising activities. inadequacy of training and lack of income are the main constraints expressed by women. The project will develop a participatory strategy based on the elaboration of local development programmes targeted on women and will include income generating activities. Of course this does not mean that all women will be concerned by the creation of IGA at the same time Nevertheless, it is important to take into consideration the needs of all women and to improve their living conditions (community development approach). Different groups will be formed according to common interests and objectives (social and/or economic). such as: to become literate, to begin or improve animal production, to improve agricultural production, to develop skills in food processing, to create small scale enterprises in various areas like food and milk processing, handicrafts..
Since the Project has not the capacities to carry out all support activities needed, it will play the role of catalyst, facilitator and link and facilitator with relevant and competent institutions and resource persons to provide concerned women with relevant services. Skilled women -particularly' those living in villages- and "pioneers" women in some areas (like food processing, home gardens and nurseries implementation. etc.) should be identified and used as resource and contact persons for extension and specific training.
The Project will focus its role on self-help groups formation, and will try to guide the groups towards self-reliance and sustainability, particularly through IGAs (helping a group to become sustainable is a slow process, since women do not have history in group-based activities) Even if group formation is a challenge, it should be experimented because it is the best way to develop human resources and initiative capacities which are the basis of self-confidence and self-reliance.
Training for women's community will include technical training sessions, IGA awareness and small-scale enterprise development courses.
4 - Multi-disciplinary approach and collaboration with existing institutions
Natural resources management is an all-encompassing and integrated which requires close collaboration between technical disciplines and the availability of multidisciplinary skills among staff implementing the project. This is the context of the present situation: the Project and the multi-disciplinary' approach will have to be reinforced with the implementation of gender activities. According to the limited resources (included human resources) and in order to maximize existing competencies in both countries, the Project will establish as far as possible links with the existing institutions which support gender activities. Institutional relations with the Extension Directorates should be concluded in both countries according to the priority role the extension services will have to play in the areas of the Project. particularly for technical training courses. Ministry of Social Affairs should be an other priority partner in both country. Partnership agreements will be concluded for appropriate services.
All existing IGAs projects regarding women are at an experimental stage and the acquired experience should be considered with attention. In Jordan there are many agencies concerned with women's development and, although their scale of operations is relatively small, they often have overlapping or duplicate projects. The Project should use their competencies, and particular attention will be given to the institutions which serve the ion' income groups (Ministry of Social Affairs, national and international NGOs like Queen Alia Fund, Care International, international agencies like UNIFEM, etc) NGOs are incontestably the most skilled to develop and implement gender activities at grass roots level and some have got valuable experience in productive projects and in promoting women participation in, decision making. This is the reason for why the Project should seek the collaboration of these ONGs in its areas of intervention. Experiences in Jordan can also be suitable to Syria and the regional vocation of the Project is a great advantage for the transfer of know-how.
In both countries collaboration should be very close with Women's Unions (The Federation of Jordanian Union and The General Women's Union). These are the only official women's associations, they have similar objectives to promote female groups and consequently should be widely involved in the gender activities of the FAO Project.
All institutions involved in gender activities in the areas of the Project will be identified (rapid appraisal) as well as representatives and leaders of Women's Union.
The gender activities implemented by the Project should be suitable to the "UN Programme for Women Development in Syria" (UNFPA) and to the "Programme Support for Women's Economic empowerment in Jordan" (UNIFEM)
5 - Redeployment of staff and capacity building
If there are no gender persons in its staff, the Project will face difficulties to implement gender activities. One woman (competencies in socio-economics would be an asset) should be posted at the Headquarters of the FAO Project in Damascus and, as far as possible, at the Department of Afforestation and Forest in Amman.
Female extensionists (Ministry of Agriculture) should be involved in its activities at least at extension unit level in Syria and at district level in Jordan.
A female promotor or contact farmer, chosen by the women's community and integrant part of this community, should be the principal piece and the key position for the success of the activity. She might receive incentives through food rations of World Food Programmes and a minimal office equipment.
Training programmes for the staff involved should focus on participatory methods as Participatory Rural Appraisal, community and local development methods, group promotion as well as IGAs process and small-scale enterprise management.
6 - Implementation of income generating activities (IGAs)
Identification of IGAs should come from a bottom-up approach and after having' carried out a diagnosis of the situation. analysis of problems and constraints through participatory methods. Consequently the IGAs identified during the mission should be considered as the results of a preliminary investigation according to the following constraints: slight number of villages visited, short time spent in the villages as well as the inadequate number of women attending the meetings
Potential IGAs to be supported in priority should be the activities traditionally undertaken by women and for which they already possess skills. In addition these IGAs should have low start-up costs (included investment), be easily under control of women and should be implemented at the village level. A range of IGAs can be proposed according to specific conditions of villages, as the following:
- food processing (dried fruit, vegetables and herbs: processed fruit and vegetables .
- preparation and marketing of dairy products;
- agricultural activities (home carders vegetables, medicinal herbs. fruit-tree nurseries mushroom's cultivation):
- livestock and poultry raising
- silkworm breedings,
- handicrafts (carpet making, knitting, serving, etc):
- shopkeeper activities (backery.. )
IGAs should act as a catalyst to promote self-help groups and reinforce their capacities; the final objective being the formation of sustainable groups able to follow and manage the activity without external support (subsidies and grants). Feasibility studies are essential to identify suitable IGAs' opportunities that could be considered for implementation The feasibility studies would, inter alia, include realistic and detailed financial cash flow analyses which would demonstrate not only the financial feasibility, of the enterprises but also the financial requirements.
IGAs should be seen as the first phase of a progression to small business development and should show a certain level of profitability to ensure self-sustainability. Grants and subsidies should be used with caution and it is important that the real costs were supported by the beneficiaries. The Project will support them to find ways of financing either through
existing institutions or through the channels of NGOs (as well as Ministry of Agriculture for [FAD project) or through the establishment of a revolving fund at village level (to be managed by beneficiaries themselves).
Although IGAs can be implemented at individual level. the Project should encourage those to be implemented at group level. Beneficiaries should take part in all stages of the IGA implementation from the identification to the launching (that is to say feasibility planning financial ways...)
7 - Gender activities as experimentations
Gender activities programme should be experimented at small scale in some pilot villages chosen in the areas already selected by the Project and where some sylvo-pastoral activities have already been implemented that is to say:
- Jordan: selected areas in the districts of Salt (Ire Yarga) Ajloun and Jerash. In Ajloun and Jerash districts, villages among those where PRA were earned out in 1995 should be selected;
- Syria: villages already concerned by the actions of the Project as those located in the areas of Al-Zeitounah (Lattakia) Trungi (Quneitra! Marassat Al-Khatib (Aleppo). More investigation should be made in the new areas selected in May 1996 to select the village to be concerned. These three areas located in Tartous Hama and Home Mahafazat fulfil the conditions described in the first paragraph of this chapter
About 6 villages in Jordan and 15 in Syria could be selected according to the potentiality of IGAs implementation. Great importance should be given to the socio-economic context and the motivation of women as well as the possible existence of external resources. both material and human (particularly Women's Unions members).
Since the World Food Programme (WFP) has similar objectives (participatory natural resources management including IGAs for women) a complementarity could be found between both UN institutions to maximize the use of resources. WFP could provide food rations and office equipment for female promotors at village level and participate 10 the startup costs of IGAs in providing funds or equipments which will constitute the revolving fund. The repayments of the beneficiaries according negotiated modalities will sustain the revolving fund in order to increase the activities and to benefit other beneficiaries.
