Relaunching rural radio in Niger

This training session forms part of a series of six rural radio training programmes under the TCP/NER/2903 project: Relaunching rural radio in Niger. It was held at Gaya from 25 August to 5 September 2003. The trainees (the majority of whom were women, 15 out of 23 attendees) were from public, private and community radio stations, NGOs and other associations.



The training was divided into two phases: theoretical and practical.

The course adopted a participatory and interactive approach, with papers followed by debates, group discussions, sharing experiences in plenary, and evaluations.

The first approach to the subject was with an analysis of biological versus social gender. Starting with the concept of the woman with a thousand hands, the participants examined women's activities connected with reproduction and production.

The gender situation in Niger was then analysed. Many participants stressed the institutional environment (legal status, texts and legislation), the socio-cultural hurdles that hamper women's advancement, and the socioeconomic constraints confronting them. Political participation by women in Niger was also examined.

They discussed the experiences of the NGOs and other associations in terms of gender. Then the NGOs illustrated the programmes and activities they had implemented in relation to the subject of the course. Information on the situation of rural men and women was collected, taking account of the different types of surveys (including documentary research and interviews), the types of interviews (directed, semi-directed or non-directed) and the level at which the data was gathered (individual, group or macro level). Gender issues in development projects and programmes, and in professional practice, were also appraised.

Another part of the training programme was an analysis of the stakeholders in a development situation. This analysis made it possible to explain the notion of stakeholder and types of stakeholders according to the players' interest in the implementation of a particular development project or programme.

The main purpose of the training course was to initiate the trainees into Socio-Economic and Gender Analysis (SEAGA). This type of analysis was designed by the Gender Equality and Development Service at the FAO Sustainable Development Department in the framework of the Socio-Economic and Gender Analysis Programme (SEAGA). The purpose was to identify the needs, responsibilities and priorities of men and women, and to analyse their roles and their relations, taking account of other variables such as age, socioeconomic level, ethnicity and religion. After the presentation of SEAGA by the instructors, the trainees worked in groups, carrying out a SEAGA analysis of their own home regions.

The participants were also familiarised with the tools used for a field analysis, that is to say, analysing communities, households and individuals. The SEAGA analysis distinguishes between three (3) toolkits: development context analysis, livelihoods analysis, and stakeholders' development priorities analysis. They then broke up into groups to apply some of the toolkits to analyse the situation in their home regions.

At the end of the first part of the course, each trainee drew up an individual plan for integrating the SEAGA approach into their work, saying how and when the approach would be integrated, and what actions would be taken.

Lastly, they had the opportunity to use the knowledge they had acquired in the theoretical phase of the course by producing radio broadcasts to sensitise their listeners to gender equality issues.

The purpose of this second phase of the course was also to collect further information in the field using the tools they had learnt in the previous phase, but this time it was in terms of the themes chosen for the production of the broadcasts. In order to meet and interview the stakeholders they had identified, the teams went out into the field.

The two broadcasts produced during the course in the Niger's main languages - Haoussa and Zarma - were listened to and critiqued by the participants. They were then broadcast on the participating radio stations.

These programme were entitled, The contribution of Dendi women to poultry production through duck rearing and Combating the water hyacinth.