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Executive Summary
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Introduction
This report provides a record of a seminar held at the Golden Pillow, Polokwane in Limpopo on 20 July 2007 to explore some of the challenges pertinent to community-driven development and sustainable livelihoods in Limpopo. The title of the seminar was “How can services operate at scale to promote sustainable livelihoods in Limpopo?”.
Lechesa Tsenoli, MP and Chair of Khanya-aicdd Board of Directors welcomed guests to the Seminar. He remarked that Limpopo is an important venue for the country this year, as it will provide the venue for the ANC’s Growth and Development Summit. He also stated that the seminar would provide a useful platform to identify ways in which people can make practical contributions to influencing the policy work being done around Sustainable Livelihoods. He pointed out that some of the challenges currently facing SA included the influx of political and economic refugees from neighbouring countries
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“Capricorn, the home of excellence and opportunities for a better life”
by Councillor M. J Matsaung
The Seminar was officially opened by Councillor M. J Matsaung, MMC for Water and Sanitation, Capricorn District Municipality who delivered an opening speech on behalf of the Executive Mayor, Capricorn District Municipality.
His speech highlighted the role of implementing agents in delivering services to the community, and noted that community-driven solutions work best within fairly decentralised government systems. He further stated that HIV/AIDS continues to remain a challenge, in spite of numerous interventions and indicated that the effectiveness of community-driven approaches should be at the centre of this debate. In closing he said that society stands to benefit significantly if it can find local solutions to local challenges.
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Introduction to Khanya-aicdd and our approach by Dr Ian Goldman
Ian Goldman, CEO of Khanya-aicdd gave an overview of Khanya-aicdd and it’s approach to Sustainable Livelihoods and work currently being done in Limpopo.
Khanya-managing rural change was formed in 1998. Our head office is in a rural province – the Free State - where we are an important development actor. Our focus quickly fell on the sustainable livelihoods approach, and the challenge of linking the community-service agency level (micro-meso levels).
Our mission focuses on how to link the local government level with communities. Three major lines of work emerged: on local government, particularly around planning, on communitybased planning (CBP), on community-based services, and more recently, on local economic development (LED). There was also an important focus on action-learning approaches and learning by doing.
Our approach has been based on the Sustainable Livelihoods Approach (SLA) – notably the SL Framework, the SL Principles and a set of six governance issues which Khanya-aicdd has developed to address these – based around empowering communities, strengthening local government, and realigning the centre to support these effectively, as well as providing strategic direction.
Khanya-aicdd has been involved in a number of pieces of work in Limpopo and in closing, Mr. Goldman stated that he looked forward to reinforcing Khanya-aicdd’s contact in the province.
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Comprehensive Health Care Limpopo Province by Louise Batty, CHOICE Trust
The CHoiCE Trust is an NGO based in Tzaneen, Mopane District and as it’s core business offers training courses that have been accredited by health and welfare SETA (HWSETA). Their work involves mobilizing the community to be part of home-based care giving in the community.
Their Home-based care projects cover a number of areas as follows:
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Food sustainability projects: comprises a communal garden for the community (the elderly, orphans) to access food. Caregivers also have their own ‘door-sized’ gardens;
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PLWA Support Projects: Previously they had AIDS support groups, and they now have 17 PLWA support groups and 14 wellness training and ART Preparation Groups;
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Grandy Support groups: providing support to grandparents caring for orphaned children;
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Orphan and Vulnerable Children (OVC) Support group/ Project: Volunteers support children through their school and home lives and provide group therapy to these children;
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Scouts: have been adapted as a wonderful tool for kids to learn leadership skills.
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The challenge of developing small-holder farmers: how can we have an impact at scale?’
Mortimer Mannya & Joe Ramaru
Mr. Mortimer Mannya gave a presentation on the process of developing, implementing and upscaling a participatory approach to extension services across the Limpopo Department of Agriculture. When he joined the Limpopo Department of Agriculture (LDA), in 1995 he found that the department was unable to adequately respond to the farmers’ constraints.
The process emphasised participation of farmers and extension officers. It used an action learning approach that allowed extension officers to work closely with farmers with a view to mobilizing and organizing them. To facilitate this, they used a range of methodologies.
During this process, a number of changes evolved which included management processes being used, competencies in development issues, improved facilitation skills and leadership development.. The results achieved from this process included competency development within the department; strengthening of local organisations; support given to two other provinces who were interested in initiating a similar process and reviewing the entire value chain.
Some of the key lessons learned included the importance of an assigned team of implementers at all level to champion extension reforms; that “local is lekker”; the importance of external back-stoppers at an initial stage in order to build up an internal mentoring system and the need for a coordinated platform for service providers.
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Can Community-driven development be scaled up?
by Hans P. Binswanger - Mkhize
Hans Binswanger gave a presentation on approaches to CDD and Local Development, examples of scaled up programs and reasons why this has not occurred in South Africa. He also presented a step-by-step approach to scaling up.
He noted that three different approaches to working with communities had been developed as follows: the service delivery approach; the intermediary model and the empowerment model. None of these approaches can tackle the problem of local development. The emerging consensus around local and community-driven development is that an integrated local development is a co-production of communities, local governments, government sectors, and private organizations and that roles need to be properly defined, and actors need to be fully empowered in order to execute their roles, in particular with finances
Some illustrations of scaled up programmes include:
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In Mexico – where over one million projects in 15 years, nationwide – much of it in infrastructure;
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In Brazil – Over 300,000 projects in 1100 poor municipalities – much of it in infrastructure;
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In Indonesia: Infrastructure program at the Kamecatan level:
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Burkina Faso: National program, with formula-driven grants.
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Community based approaches to water and sanitation: ‘Do they work or impact at scale – the Mvula experience?’
Goodenough Molefe, Mvula Trust
Sanitation job creation projects began in 2006/7 where CBOs, largely run by women, were running block making plants. Municipalities had given them good support and were influencing service providers to utilize block making plants. Pilots began in 2005/6 and have been done in Kwa-Zulu Natal & Limpopo.
Sanitation Job Creation Projects comprise partnerships with the local government and community; are a sustainable investment for donors; can contribute to an increase in the skills base of local government and a reduction in women’s vulnerability; can generate capital in the community and increase growth of local micro-economy.
Some of the challenges and lessons learnt during this process included: a limited availability of key project stakeholders; a lack of commitment from key stakeholders; integrating projects for sustainability and little executive support given to projects.
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Closing Remarks
In closing, Karuna Mohan, Member of the Khanya-aicdd Board of Directors emphasised the need to demonstrate how approaches to community-driven development can be implemented and scaled up. She suggested that Khanya-aicdd establishes a learning site at the municipal level in order to showcase the social, economic and infrastructure development being implemented.
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