Good practice for livelihoods-based emergency response

Panel chair: Adrian Cullis, FAO
 

1. Community participation in emergencies: does it make a difference?
   
   Presenter: Berhanu Admassu, Tufts University
   
   This presentation provides a rapid overview of the evidence that shows how the involvement of local people in the analysis, design, implementation and evaluation of emergency projects has improved impact, and has made critical contributions to the evidence base for developing national and international good practice guidelines. The presentation covers experiences in South Sudan, Kenya and Ethiopia, with specific examples of how commitment to participation by coordination bodies and implementing agencies has led to effective programming and better impact assessment. The presentation focuses on drought responses and complex emergencies.
    

2. People matter: Why is community participation a core standard in the Livestock Emergency Guidelines and Standards (LEGS)?

   Presenter: Cathy Watson, Coordinator, LEGS

   The Livestock Emergency Guidelines and Standards (LEGS) has participation as a core standard. This presentation explains the reasoning for this approach, drawing on experiences from Africa and Asia. The presentation then also explains how a participatory approach is operationalised by LEGS in project assessment and design, through the Participatory Response Identification Matrix (PRIM) as a rapid assessment tool for use with local stakeholders. The presentation also describes how much of the evidence underpinning LEGS has been derived from systematic participatory impact assessment.
    

3. Participatory Impact Assessment: Framework for integrating local perception and conventional methods in the analysis of impacts

   Presenter: Dawit Abebe, Tufts University

   In the Horn of Africa, participatory impact assessment (PIA) has probably been the single most useful approach for understanding the impact and attribution of programmes during drought and complex emergencies. This presentation focuses on an important aspect of PIA: the systematic use of participatory methods to produce datasets for conventional statistical analysis. When combined with comparative analysis, this development partly explains why PIA findings have been so valuable. The presentation describes these experiences by reference to far wider body of experience with “participatory numbers” during surveys and evaluations of developnment projects.
    

4. Q&A