Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) Documentation in Poblacion
Vieja, Batuan, Bohol, Philippines
CBDC Bohol Project, SEARICE, Philippines
Year: 2001
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This paper summarizes the approaches and
methods used in the collection of information through the
Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) methods carried out by the
CBDC-Bohol project. PRA is an approach that allows the full
participation of farmers or villagers in appraising their
community background and current situation. A PRA was
conducted in Poblacion Vieja, Batuan, Bohol in order to
identify appropriate interventions in the community farming
system using tools such as mapping, seasonal calendars, field
survey, group discussion, diagramming and interviews. PRA
tools had been used to generate information in order to
analyze the information and plan for the succeeding
activities.
The trend of the community's agricultural
system was analyzed through farmers' recollection of past
information. The traditional farming of the community was
replaced by modern farming through the Green Revolution
Technology. The traditional varieties were replaced by formal
released varieties associated with the use of synthetic
fertilizers and pesticides. These varieties have dominated
their farming system recently. Information about the economic,
social and political structure of the community were likewise
gathered such as the credit and marketing system, and
different organizations working within the community. The
overall system was viewed at enhancing and sustaining the
community's capacity to exist in society.
With regards to the methodology, the
diversity of crops planted by the farmer-participants was
mostly captured during the workshop. Most of the participants
were male farmers (68% of the 28 participants) and they
dominated most of the workshops and discussions, particularly
the local officials. Hence, about five of the domineering
participants, who are local officials, were grouped together
to performed separate workshops from other non-dominating
farmers
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In agricultural research, there is an increasing need
to analyze location-specific problems in their own environments. Many
approaches using participatory methods and techniques for agricultural
research and development have been suggested. On-farm research has its
origin in the farming system research (FSR) methodology developed by the
agricultural research institutions in the 1970s. Such institutes are the
Farming System Research Institute (FSRI) of the Department of
Agriculture in Thailand and the Farming Systems Research Institute of
the University of the Philippines Los Baños (UPLB), Philippines. In
this approach, procedures were developed to involve researchers,
extension workers and the farmers as participants in conducting research
and extension on community farming systems (Lightfoot 1991). Farmers’
participation in agricultural research became an objective for many
researchers when they recognized that farmers were experimenters
(Chambers 1992). Farming systems research aims to analyze the factors
affecting community’s decisions to adopt or reject a certain
technology.
Participatory rural appraisal (PRA) helps to
understand the area quicker than the conventional methods because it is
flexible in approach and does not need any proposed activities.
Questionnaire surveys tend to be tedious, inaccurate and difficult to
use (Chambers 1992). PRA is an alternative approach that provides a
quick collection of information using cost-effective methods of
learning, and it is proven useful for planning at the local level (Rifkin
1992).
The term PRA embraces a series of techniques using
local peoples' knowledge and skills to understand local conditions,
identify local problems and plan responses to them (Heaver 1992). It
draws on systems and involves ecological thinking, paying attention to
space, time, flows and relationships of bio-resources, relative values
and decisions.
The role of the community is the key to the approach
and is crucial for the generation of the appraisal. Recently, this
approach has been instrumental to the CBDC project's research
methodologies in the field of agriculture. A major reason is the
prospect of gaining information about the community farming system
quickly and cheaply. More importantly, however, is the greater
participation of farmers in the community that leads to more effective
and efficient information generating. This is because many of the
information are visually presented to them through maps, graphs,
diagrams, illustrations and so on, which are easily understood.
Poblacion Vieja is part of Batuan municipality and is
one of the major rice-producing communities in the town. Batuan, located
at the interior part of Bohol, lies 51 kilometers away from Tagbilaran
City (Figure 1.). The community is part of the Green Revolution area in
the 1970s, making it an ideal study area for the project. This paper
summarizes the approaches and methods used in the collection of
information through the PRA methods carried out by the CBDC-Bohol
project. It also attempts to present an overview of the community being
studied.
This report aimed to document the CBDC project's
experiences with a participatory rural appraisal conducted in the
community (Poblacion Vieja, Batuan, Bohol) and to understand the
community background to identify appropriate interventions in the
community farming system.
The information gathered serves as benchmark
information in preparing the project activities in the area. It will
include community plant genetic resources enhancement (participatory
plant breeding and plant varietal selection), other participatory
researches (like ecological pest management and soil fertility
management) and
the season-long farmers’ field school training on sustainable
agriculture management.
Participatory rural appraisal was identified as a
more efficient approach in data gathering compared to previous
methodologies (e.g. individual interviews) employed by the project. This
approach involved particular activities as follows:
Clarifying the project's objectives to the community
It is important to clarify the proposed objectives of the project to the community.
The project generally aims to strengthen farmers'
role in conserving and developing plant genetic resources within the
framework of sustainable agriculture. Long-term objectives in this
particular community were identified during the consultation. They were:
- Total elimination of pesticide use
- Use of locally available organic (non-synthetic) materials as fertilizer
- Development of farmers’ varieties adapted to the specific location
- Improvement of breeding skills of farmers in the community
- Farm diversification and integration (increased diversity for food security)
- Community organization
- Gender balance and sensitivity in agriculture
- Establishment of a community seed network within and among the
project communities
- Farmers' participation and empowerment
Setting key indicators for the community project
Based on the objectives, the project identified
essential indicators in order to determine and assess its impact in the
community. These indicators are essential to those working in community
development. Impact assessment formed is part of the internal monitoring
and management system in order to re-plan and redirect on-going project
activities. Important indicators are listed below:
- Increase in organic matter content of the soil
- Increase in number of natural enemies of rice pests
- Development of rice varieties (farmers' selection varieties)
- Diversified farming system
- Creation of one farmer-breeders' group
- An established market support network
- Reduced hired labor (to minimize cost of production)
- Increase in number of sustainable agriculture practitioners
- An established community seed bank
- Farmer-facilitated meetings and other activities
- Farmers’ cooperation with the project
- Farmers conducting their own on-farm researches
- Equal participation of both gender in all activities
- load of work
- timing of activities
Identifying relevant information and PRA tools
Prior to the actual community workshops, the project
also prepared a simple list of information to be gathered, their
relevance to the study, and their collection. The information obtained
determined the tools used in implementation. The checklist used is
presented in Table 1.
Learning methods
1. Introductory Phase
During the initial discussions with the community,
the project staff gave an orientation and a brief background of the
project to the community. Thereafter, the staff introduced themselves to
the farmers and vice versa. Part of this orientation was a presentation
of the experiences of the project in other communities (on-farm
activities, project’s focus crops, etc.) and the PRA objectives and
tools so that farmers would have a clear understanding on the importance
of the activity. In addition, the farmers established a time schedule
for the next two days.
2. Community Workshops
Twenty-eight farmer-participants attended the PRA
activity, a manageable number for the project to handle.
Sixty-eight percent (68%) were male farmers and
the rest were female farmers. Two separate workshops were run
simultaneously to cover different PRA requirements, with female farmers
equally distributed in the groups. All activities for data gathering by
community workshops and field works including community validation were
concluded in two days.
Checklist of information gathered during the PRA.
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Information gathered |
Relevance |
Tools used |
1. Cropping pattern
- rainfall pattern
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- scheduling of project’s activities
- determine what crops are grown
- determine the availability of farmers |
- Seasonal calendar |
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2. Land ownership |
- determine the tenurial status of farmers
- determine the extent of involvement of
farmers on project’s activities |
- Mapping |
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3. Availability of farmers |
- scheduling of activities |
- Seasonal calendar |
4. Social structures
|
- identify organizing strategy of the project |
- Venn diagram |
5. Farming system
- diversity
- cultural management practices
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- amount of seeds (distribution, number of varieties farmers can handle)
- history, trend
- inventory of resources
- timing of intervention (related to
sustainable agriculture |
- Time line |
6. Resource map
- location of farms, crops and organic materials |
- location of resource (geographical)
- land use
- monitoring |
- Mapping
- Transect map |
7. Labor availability
|
- schedule of activities
|
- Seasonal calendar |
|
8. Off-farm activities |
- determine farmer’s other sources of income |
- Pie diagram |
9. Credit/ marketing system
- (number of farmers who are dependent on millers) |
- type of intervention/ support (e.g., linkage, coordination) |
- Seasonal calendar
(time)
- Venn diagram
(source) |
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10. Income/ yields
- cost of production |
- impact of the project’s intervention
(economic)
- determine the crop productivity
|
- Seasonal calendar
- Resource mapping |
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11. Soil analysis |
- recommended fertilizer |
- Transect |
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12. Seed supply system |
- seed exchange
- establish community seed bank |
- Venn diagram |
13. Gender roles
|
- extent of involvement of both genders |
- Matrix ranking |
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14. Problems related to farming |
- Intervention of the project |
- Seasonal calendar
- Transect map |
The project staff briefly explained to farmers the workshop
exercises. Facilitation by project staff on these exercises was
necessary. The type of information needed and how these information were
to be collected were explained to the farmers. The workshop program is
outlined below.
Day 1- Resource mapping:
- Social mapping
- Seasonal calendar
- Venn diagram
- Credit system
- Seed supply system
Day 2 - Marketing system:
- Social structure
- Matrix ranking
- Sources of livelihood (Pie diagram)
- Gender roles
- Transect walk
- Transect map
- Time line
- Data validation / triangulation
a. Community mapping
Maps were used to locate features of ecological and
social environments, as a guide to people's perception of the
environment in which they lived and worked and as a shared source of
reference for discussion (Cornwall 1992). Both workshop groups did the
community mapping. The first group performed the social mapping
and the second group worked on the resource mapping. The latter group
produced a detailed map and properly located their houses, community
infrastructure, local resources, farmlands and others. Thereby, farms
and other resources could easily be located by the staff during
monitoring. Farmers preferred to use the materials provided by the staff
for ease and both groups were given approximately two to three hours to
complete the exercises.
b. Seasonal calendar
The calendar exercises included mapping the cropping
pattern, rainfall distribution, typhoon risk, farm productivity and
income, special community occasions and the crops cultivated. In the cropping pattern, the farmers presented the
time of planting and harvesting of different crops cultivated in the
community in a period of one year. The presentation was made by
illustrating the crop cultivated on its corresponding planting month
within the year. In terms of income, expenses and credit in their farms,
the group drew peso bills in denominations of 20, 50, 100 and 500 for
each of the corresponding months. The peso bill however, represented
their estimation of the amount entailed in a certain period. Hence, the
interpretation was that, the bigger the denomination, the higher the
amount. In a seasonal calendar, the interrelationship between the
cropping pattern, farmers’ alternative sources of income, social
activities and the availability of labor could likewise be seen.
c. Venn diagram
These diagrams were used to identify the institutions
present in the community and the latter’s relationship and access to
these institutions. In this exercise, four different types of
information were obtained, namely; the community’s credit system,
marketing system, social structure and seed supply system. The size and
the thickness of the circle described the prevalent source or
institution and the direction of the arrow indicated the flow of the
interaction. The exercise assisted in understanding the
interrelationships in the village and in identifying the groups or key
individuals of a certain institution or organization that influence the
community most.
d. Pie diagram
The pie chart was used to rank the overall sources of
livelihood in the community (on-farm and off-farm sources of income).
Farmers themselves gave the percentage of each source of income and the
size of the pie determined the share of each source.
e. Matrix ranking
To perform the matrix ranking on gender roles, the
male and female farmers were separated into two workshop groups. Both
groups were asked to rank their participation in both on-farm and
off-farm activities. The main objective for this was to determine and
assess different views of both farmers (males and females) in their
degree of involvement or participation. Both groups did the percentage
rating with respect to their participation in every activity.
The results of the two workshop groups were entirely
different. According to the male farmers, they dominated most of the
farm activities and that the females focused more on the household
activities. Women farmers, however, opposed this view. According to
them, women’s activities included participation in farming,
particularly on the seed system (seed selection, storage, exchange,
etc.). Both genders agreed that farming, in general, is designed for
male farmers when it involves the use of heavy mechanized farm
implements or working animals. Only a few female farmers can do the
same.
f. Time line
The time line group of farmers was composed of the
older farmers in the community. They were asked to recollect the history
of the village from the 1930s to the 1990s including important events,
agricultural practices, and major changes including the occurrence and
incidence of pests in their farms.
g. Transect walk and the map
The transect map and walk were done to know the
characteristics of the village environment by analyzing the cross
section of the community’s land. The walk covered approximately 500
meters and different observations were illustrated in the transect map.
Important things were noted during the transect walk (type of soil, soil
fertility, trees, farm crops, farm animals, existing problems in
specific location, etc.). The direction of walk was discussed beforehand
and was determined based on the degree of plant diversity and the
elevation (from lower to higher) using the community resource map.
Farmers noted their observations every 100 steps from the starting point
up to the identified end-point of the route.
Day 3.Community Validation:
At the end of all community workshops, all
information gathered were fed back to the group of farmers for further
verification and to fill in identified gaps. Farmer-participants were
able to present and explain their findings to the group and these were
synthesized by the project staff. The staff and farmers thoroughly
validated all the information in every workshop output. The project
staff likewise identified which group or individual was participating
most in the discussion during the data validation. The validation also
aimed to assess farmers' participation and provide recommendations.
Specific observations and experiential learning by
the project staff with the use of different PRA tools in various
activities were also documented. These observations and learning
experiences are essential to the internal evaluation of the project and
to the planning of methodologies for the project to be more effective in
the succeeding activities.
In the community resource mapping, most farmers spent
much time trying to make the drawings attractive for the presentation
that there may be other resources or information they failed to mention.
During the presentation and validation, they no longer added the
additional information or resources enumerated by other farmers in the
map. Male farmers also dominated in this activity (workshop and
discussion). Hence, the staff should pay attention to each workshop
group.
During the presentation and validation of the
seasonal calendar, farmers were willing to share their knowledge and
they even added some relevant information like the occurrence of typhoon
in the area. The inter-relationship between the cropping system,
financial system and social activities of the farmer was seen and
understood.
The untapped or hidden resources in the community
such as the water pump in the spring was discovered in the transect
walk. Likewise, it was easier to see the trend over the years in the
community in the timeline. In terms of plant genetic resources,
traditional varieties changed to modern varieties.
The availability of the male and female farmers as
well as the involvement of women farmers in farming was determined by
understanding on gender roles in the matrix ranking. This is important
in scheduling the succeeding activities of the project.
Problems were identified and analyzed in two
different discussions. One major discussion concerned the problems
identified with the community’s farming system. The second concerned
are the methodologies being employed by the project, since this was a
new approach in gathering the baseline data of the village.
Employed Methodologies
The entire community workshop was very ‘extractive’
on the part of the farmers. The activities were continuous and rapid and
the exercises were done in only two days. At the start of the community
exercises, farmer-participants were provided with necessary materials
like manila papers, pentel pens, meter sticks, colored papers,
coloring pens, chalk and others, to do their own workshops. In this
sense, farmers were limited to what the project provided. They were then
allowed to use anything from the surrounding such as leaves, pebbles,
soil, twigs, etc. to represent an information on the village.
It was noted that most of the male farmers,
especially the community officials dominated most of the discussions and
workshops. These farmers are used to this situation since they have
their regular council meetings. Other farmers had no or less opportunity
to participate in the activity.
The information was analyzed to get a detailed
picture of the local resources, land use and crop diversity as well as
to identify problems and opportunities. However, the state of local
resources during the PRA in May 1998 was severely influenced by El Niño.
Some crops known to be cultivated in the community as well as the crop
diversity of their neighboring farms were not mentioned. Only rice,
corn, coconut, and banana were named. It is unfortunate that the staff
failed to bring up the issue in the workshop.
In the social Venn diagram, it was also noted that
the members of different organizations were unknown. It is because the
project staff-facilitator failed to ask this from the farmers. Also, the
respective percentages of household rice consumption and marketing to
miller-traders and to other outlets was not determined. The status of
soil fertility was not assessed within the framework of the transect
walk. The relevance or the use of all information gathered through each
tool was not adequately discussed with the community.
Some observations on the community farming system
The Green Revolution ushered the introduction of farm
technology packages consisting of high yielding varieties and chemical
inputs to farmers, which resulted in the decline of traditional farming.
Traditional varieties were replaced by modern varieties (time line).
During the late 1990s, the community experienced a very long dry season
(El Niño). Being mainly rainfed with no irrigation system, most of the
farmers were unable to plant rice for a full season. Hence, most of
their rice varieties were lost and only four rice varieties planted were
rescued (Venn diagram). Thus, the El Niño adversely affected the
community farming system.
Some of the farmer-participants had already undergone
training on integrated pest management (IPM) conducted by the Department
of Agriculture (DA). Hence, it was assumed that these farmers were
already aware of pest control methods or farming with low external
inputs and minimal use of pesticides. However, it was noticed that
locally available organic materials in the community like the Mekania
cordata (bukot-bukot), Gliricidia sepium (madre de cacao),
animal manure, and other green manure plants were not utilized as
alternatives to inorganic fertilizers (synthetic fertilizers). Farmers'
reasoned out that it was very laborious to convert these materials into
organic fertilizers that are readily available for their respective
farms.
With respect to land tenure, most of the
farmer-participants were tenants, meaning that farm decisions were
mostly dependent on their landowners. These were mostly absentee
landlords, being engaged in business or other employment. Hence, it was
largely believed hat they would not take any risks or make major changes
such as the shift to sustainable approach as advocated by the project.
Moreover, in the sharing arrangement, the tenants pay
a fixed quantity every harvest (twice a year) whether they had any
harvest or not. Thus, small farmers tend to shift to cost-effective
methods of rice farming (e.g., using the locally available organic
materials and ecological pest management) that are sustainable. This is
in fact an opportunity for small farmers to go into organic farming as
their contracts does not stipulate the type of farming they should
practice.
The PRA methodology was found to be essential to the
CBDC project, especially on its community development-oriented projects.
Since it has the advantage of being participatory, it can quickly
generate information and systematically analyze data. In fact, this
approach has already been employed in other research areas of the
project.
After a thorough and rigid analysis of the data
gathered, the project staff made some general recommendations for the
identified weaknesses of the methodology and the study area. For the
methodology, there is a need for more detailed preparations prior to the
actual community workshops. Topics to be discussed and the significance
of each PRA tool should be thoroughly discussed with farmers so that
they will have a clear understanding on the use of the data gathered.
All staff should be knowledgeable on each PRA tool to be able to
substitute for each other. Minimal materials should be provided to
trigger the group's resourcefulness and creativity in using available
materials within the community (like leaves, etc.) to produce ‘pictures
of information’ about their community.
Each workshop group should have a facilitator,
documenter and reporter, and farmers should be given a chance to rotate
among and within the working groups. A way to avoid having one or more
participants who will dominate the activity, is to group them according
to their characteristics or profile. Like for instance, all officials of
the village are grouped together to do separate workshop as it was later
done after the first workshop (community mapping).
Other participants should be encouraged to partake in
the activity and speak up by closely supervising the flow of discussion
and activity. There should be more time allotted to activities. Not
every exercise must be hurried to allow ample rest for farmers and the
staff.
With respect to their farming system, the lost
varieties including new varieties from farmers' selection and formally
released cultivars can be introduced from other areas to each
participating farmers by the project as part of its intervention. The
introduction of varieties will be associated with organic fertilizers
(chicken dung) so these will be grown organically. Organic farming will
serve as their individual trial plot in order for them to observe and
compare the effects of the experiment to their existing practices. It
was further discussed that the participating farmers will evaluate the
introduced varieties at the end of the experiment.
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