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In November 2022, the ‘Making Every Voice Count for Adaptive Management’ (MEV-CAM) initiative kicked off its regional knowledge exchange with a visit to Amman, Jordan.  MEV-CAM conducted a 10-day training for the FAO Jordan office, working alongside the “Enhancing resilient livelihoods and food security of host communities and Syrian refugees in Jordan and Lebanon through the promotion of sustainable agricultural development” project, funded by the European Union’s Regional Trust Fund in Response to the Syrian Crisis (the Madad Fund), which aims to improve the livelihoods and food security of vulnerable host communities affected by the Syrian crisis in Jordan and Lebanon through local agriculture development. The aim of the training was to teach project staff about process documentation and how to use it to measure impact at scale, including exercises to engage community members in the participatory process and how to apply these skills in the field. The MADAD project team then applied these skills in the field, working with community members to develop a participatory video (PV) that captured the livelihood improvements and best practices learned as a result of the project.

The field work took place at Jordan’s Zaatari refugee camp, which produces around 34 metric tons of waste daily. The waste is regularly transported to external landfills, which exerts enormous pressure on infrastructure, municipal services, and the environment.  Through the project, FAO has established a Manual Recovery Facility and has trained and employed a cohort of Syrian refugees to sort camp waste for composting, recycling, and producing renewable energy for the camp.  MEV-CAM and the MADAD project team worked directly with a handful of participants to document the changes the project had on community members' livelihoods as a result of these cash for work (CFW) opportunities. Using MEV-CAM's participatory approach, the team in Jordan extracted the best practices and skills observed by the Zaatari community.

So, what skills and outcomes did participants in MEV-CAM's Jordan training gain?

1)     Community planning skills

The first step to successfully capturing impact and change is Community Planning. This means determining who will be the main actors involved in the process, if there is gender balance, and what the key message is.  Once these key factors have been identified, participatory exercises and games can be planned accordingly with the purpose of giving a voice to the selected group of participants.

To apply these skills in Zaatari, MEV-CAM and the Jordan office carried out four days of fieldwork with the community to create a PV through MEV-CAM exercises.  This began with an ice breaker called Show & Tell, introducing hands-on video creation in a fun way, followed by a Story Circle dialogue to discuss the changes seen in Zaatari as a result of MADAD's intervention.  Both women and men shared their perspectives before using the ‘River of Life’ tool to document the challenges, impacts, indicators, and results. Women spoke of how CFW allowed them to earn money, giving them a solid  income and leading to a better gender balance in their homes. The group also said they were less depressed now that they are working  managing compost, waste management and fertilizers.

Day two of Community Planning involved the creation of the Storyboard, laying out the scenes that the community wanted to film for the PV.  They selected scenes that showed them proudly going to work, executing their new sorting skills, and even took us to their homes where we could see their gardens!

2)     Documenting and editing skills

Day two focused on Documenting, an important part in the participatory process.  The Zaatari group identified three practices to capture in their participatory video (PV): benefits of cash for work from the perspective of both women and men, a learned circular economy approach, and the result of research on biogas and compost usage.  After two full days of documenting, the Zaatari group participated in a knowledge sharing exchange, where an additional seven participants joined the session to provide insight into the first draft PV.

During the Post-Production and Editing phase, cross-pollination of knowledge and ideas is vital to the participatory process.  The group made specific suggestions on how their lives should be portrayed on film, including how they entered their worksite, with women arriving on donkey carts and men on bicycles.  Upon arrival, the PVs showed them changing clothes into the necessary protective gear before sorting, an important part of the process.  Finally, both women and men alike were very keen to show the scenes taken in their homes to demonstrate exactly their improved livelihoods due to CFW wages.

3)     The final product: participatory videos

The result of MEV-CAM's 10-day training session was two participatory videos showing the most significant change as described by the community.  One video was made entirely by the community members themselves - which is the overall goal of using participatory tools to document change - and one was made by the FAO staff.  The community’s PV involved more elaborative dialogue on the specific compost and greenhouse techniques applied in the individual homes of the participants.  In addition to the videos, three best practices were documented from Zaatari Refugee Camp.  These practices will be published into leaflets in early 2023 and accessible via the South-South Knowledge Sharing Gateway and MEV-CAM's Knowledge Management platform.

Why are these skills so important?

Everything covered in the Jordan training ensures that the documentation process is in fact participatory, providing a space for community members to express themselves accurately through PV. Through these documentation skills learned by the Jordan office, we can show the impact of change and highlight good practices for replication and dissemination, applying the UN Decade of Ecosystem Restoration's approach to sharing best practices to prevent, halt, and reverse the degradation of ecosystems.  It also ensures the knowledge documentation process is people-centered, follows a bottom-up approach, and includes practices that are as sustainable.  Farmer-to-farmer knowledge exchanges of good practices, such as those identified by MEV-CAM in Zaatari, further pursues a Humanitarian-Development-Peace Nexus (HDPN) and disaggregates conflict insensitivity about natural resources management, particularly among Syrian refugees residing in Jordan.

(c) FAO Jordan