As pointed out early in this paper, the increasing call for participatory gender and socio-economic difference sensitive agricultural planning has rarely been accompanied by suggestions for how it might be done. The projects in this workshop have demonstrated many effective methods for generating needed information and bringing it to the attention of planners and policy makers. A few projects even worked directly on the problem of how to use that information to make agricultural planning more responsive to the priorities, constraints, and needs of different groups of farmers. Thus, even though we are likely to spend much of the workshop discussing what more needs to be done, we need to remind ourselves how far we have already come and how much we can already learn from one another. It is therefore fitting to conclude this review by highlighting "best practices".
Best Practices
Projects |
Entry Points |
Ethiopia |
Use participatory planning for the design of the project's implementation strategy |
Costa Rica |
Make a detailed review of policy making processes |
Tunisia |
Consult with national planners about their information needs |
Projects |
Tools and Methods |
Namibia, Nepal, Ethiopia, India |
Combine PRA, Gender Analysis and the Analysis of Difference |
Namibia, Nepal, Ethiopia, India |
Form gender, socio-economic, and/or age specific focus groups to work with PRA/GA tools. |
Ethiopia, Nepal, Namibia, India, |
Adapt PRA and gender analysis tools to local needs |
Afghanistan Pakistan Senegal |
|
India |
Work with a person, multi-disciplinary, male-female PRA facilitator teams |
Namibia, Tunisia |
Supplement PRA information with surveys |
Ethiopia, Honduras |
Provide follow-up: train extension agents to customise extension training, build capacity of community level volunteers |
India Afghanistan |
Use participatory monitoring |
Projects |
Capacity Building |
Namibia, India, Ethiopia, Honduras |
Train trainers over several sessions interspersed with training of field staff by trained trainers and practical experiences with PRA/GA/analysis of difference |
Namibia, India, Ethiopia, Honduras |
Use training of trainers as a way to involve higher level professional staff in learning and teaching PRA/GA/analysis of difference |
Ethiopia, Namibia |
Base PRA training on local case materials |
Costa Rica, Namibia, India, Ethiopia |
Involve policy makers and senior managers in special training/discussion workshops designed specifically for them and invite them to open formal PRA training sessions |
Ethiopia |
Teach methods for responsive planning based on PRA generated information |
Honduras, Costa Rica |
Provide training for women's groups in negotiating and group development skills and support their organisations |
Projects |
Linkages and Institutionalisation |
Ethiopia, India, Namibia, Tunisia |
Promote links with policy makers, planners, and managers by inviting them to participate in discussions of implications of project results for planning |
Honduras, Costa Rica, Afghanistan, Ethiopia, India |
Promote links with the private sector, women's groups, farmer organisations, NGOs, and donors through training, workshops, information sessions, and involving them in PRA/GA exercises |
Namibia, India, Ethiopia, Honduras |
Facilitate institutionalisation by locating the project in a sub-sector line agency or in a national, regional or district planning agency |
Namibia India Ethiopia |
Suggest training in participatory gender-responsive planning methods in-service and pre-service training. |
