Post on 16-Jan-2015
description
STRENGTHENING FARMER ORGANISATIONS:A SYSTEMATIC LEARNING APPROACH FOR IMPROVED SERVICE DELIVERY
Johannes (Joe) Ramaru PICO Southern Africa
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Overview of the presentation
Introduction
The development of systemic competence
Application of the systemic competence approach and
outcomes
Competence development of extension staff
Shaping the local organizational development
Using farmer organisations to link farmers’ demand with
response for services
Broadening the operational scope of local organisations
beyond agriculture
General insights and implications
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Background
Starting the reorientation of service delivery in
Limpopo Province of South Africa - 1998
Insufficient practical know-how by officers of Ministry of the
Agriculture (MOA) on how to deliver services to the majority of
smallholder farmers
Weak local organizations that are unable to access services from
existing government programmes
BASED (broadening agricultural services and extension delivery)
program launched by MOA in May 1998
BASED: - Bilateral program implemented by MOA & supported by
GTZ (German Technical Co-operation)
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Development of Systemic Competence
Not based on modular topics, but engage people in learning
processes to enable them to perform their work better
Consists of learning instruments such as learning workshops,
mentoring field practice, peer – learning groups…
Subsequent learning workshop builds on the findings of the
previous ones and also the field experience
One of the cornerstones of the systemic competence development
approach is facilitation for change (F4C)
F4C aims at developing emancipation from inside to enable people
to better use the space they have to develop their potential
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Application of the systemic competence approach and outcomes
-Competence development of extension staff-
PEA learning cycle: PEA learning cycle: From Masvingo in Zimbabwe - the year 1998 From Masvingo in Zimbabwe - the year 1998
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Application of the systemic competence approach and outcomes
-Competence development of extension staff-
The competence development started in 1998 with 40 extension
officers & scientists from Capricorn and Vhembe districts
Newly trained peer - learning teams were given mentoring support
to develop their competencies during the practical usage of the
PEA approach
By end of 2004, competencies were developed 377 extension
officers from 5 of 6 districts in all phases of the PEA learning cycle
Out of this group, 40 were identified as trainers and mentors to
support future competence development processes
27 of the 40 officers were found to have the skills to apply the PEA
process in new contexts.
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Application of the systemic competence approach and outcomes
-Competence development of extension staff-
PEA Learning cycle :PEA Learning cycle :To Limpopo in South Africa – the year 2001 To Limpopo in South Africa – the year 2001
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Application of the systemic competence approach and outcomes
-Shaping the local organizational development from practice -
Process of community emancipation emerged when local organisations in the communities saw the need to form forums that were locally known as umbrella organisations (UOs)
UO is a village forum whose members are elected according to agreed criteria developed by the representative groups.
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Application of the systemic competence approach and outcomes
-Shaping the local organizational development from practice -
Functions of UOs varied in different communities, but they were
mainly established to:
Link with service provider and bargain for better services
Organise core experiments/activities
Coordinate activities for sharing of the experience
Support planning and monitoring of activities in all groups
Solve conflicts with minimum external support
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Application of the systemic competence approach and outcomes
-Shaping the local organizational development from practice -
Establishment and strengthening of farmer groups in the communities was enhanced through the use of codes.
Code helped farmers to internalize community values
E.g self – reliance, self – organisation, unity and cooperation and the importance of sharing and feedback
Bus code for self organisation
River code for self - reliance
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Application of the systemic competence approach and outcomes
-Shaping the local organizational development from practice -
After five years of implementing PEA, the extension officers facilitated the establishment of
63 functional UOs in 211 villages.
UOs were found to have 529 agricultural and non – agricultural interest and farmer groups.
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Application of the systemic competence approach and outcomes
- Using farmer organisations to link farmers’ demand with response for services-
Officers were also exposed to iterative learning workshops in technical areas
Development of innovation processes in: Soil fertility management, Soil and water conservation …)
Tools used to awareness creation, which helped farmers take informed decision to solve their technical problems.
Lever scale - importance of manure in improving the water holding capacity of soils
soil - trays for illustrating the effect of soil erosion on different fields
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Application of the systemic competence approach and outcomes
- Using farmer organisations to link farmers’ demand with response for services-
Type
Number of farmers Number of bags (50kg) Money contributed by farmers in Rands
99/00 00/01 01/02 99/00 00/01 01/02 99/00 00/01 01/02
2:3:2 290 242 1183 628 441 2557 46434 34504 242147LAN 204 84 1014 259 178 1218 11833 14722 106074Super 0 7 14 0 5 43 0 296 2537Totals 887 624 3878 58267 49522 350758
No. of villages
3 4 26 3 4 26 3 4 26
Table 1 Organisation and distribution of fertilisers in the Capricorn and Vhembe districts (1$= R7.8, 30 September 2011)
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Application of the systemic competence approach and outcomes
- Using farmer organisations to link farmers’ demand with response for services-
Extract of the speech by the Political Head of MOA about Smallscale seed production innovation, 26th April 2005‘ …. this initiative, which is currently being implemented in Vhembe, Capricorn, and Sekhukhune districts is expanding quickly, with 108ha of land under maize seed production. During the 2004 season, 14 230 kg of ZM521 maize seed has been treated and packaged by small-scale farmers. In the past year, farmers in Vhembe and Capricorn established a Seed Growers Associations that now has 750 members. Government has earmarked R 550 000 to help these farmers establish three seed processing centres/depots in the province….
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Application of the systemic competence approach and outcomes
- Using farmer organisations to link farmers’ demand with response for services-
Organizational capacity of the UOs in the initial three pilot villages got the attention of farmers from neighbouring villages, by 2005, Soil fertility management implemented in 105 villages Soil &water conservation implemented in 99 villages Livestock management implemented in 95 villages Small scaleseed production implemented in 98 villages
S(SSSP) = small scale seed production SFM = soil fertility management L = LivestockSWC = Soil & water conservation
SP = Sweet potatoes
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Application of the systemic competence approach and outcomes
-Broadening the operational scope of local organisation beyond agriculture-
After 2 years of strengthening local organisations, 2 of the 6 UOs were already using their organisational capabilities to access electricity and water for their communities,
By the end of 2004, UOs were supporting non – agricultural activities (electricity, fence making, HIV/Aids ..) in 114 villages
14 in Capricorn
76 in Vhembe
9 in Mopani
9 in Sekhukhune and
6 in Bohlabela
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General insights and implications
F4C enabled government & other stakeholders to jointly work with farmers to address their social & technical problems
Key to the strengthening of farmer organisations is facilitation skills and mentoring of officers during the field practice, but the effect is pronounced when used with codes for awareness creation.
Farmer organisations play a key role in agricultural innovation once they have the capacity to pool, aggregate and disseminate agricultural knowledge and information
Strong farmer groups are capable of providing basic services to their members that may not be necessarily be agriculturally related.
Strengthening farmer groups “to get the energy from below” can be used as a mechanism to channel resources from government & development agencies to communities.
Thank you so much
Malose Johannes (Joe) Ramaru ___________________________PICO Southern Africa Mobile: + 27 (0) 797907326 e mails: joe.ramaruj@picoteam.,org Website: www.picoteam.org
Eastern Cape in 2001
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