Livelihood’s vulnerability analysis is a method of assessing the impact of hazards on community livelihood resources. The tools help with planning for improving community resources.
Tool purpose:
Time needed:
• Identifying the hazards that have the most serious impact on important livelihood resources. • Determining which livelihood resources are most vulnerable. • Identifying current coping strategies and beginning to identify opportunities for adaptation. • Informing an understanding of local values of ecosystem services in relation to livelihoods and well-being and how these may change because of the threat of hazards.
1.5 hours
Materials needed:
Chart paper, note cards, markers, or other locally available resources, like sticks, stones, straw, beans, seeds, coloured powders or saw dust, etc.
Specific Topics: Livelihoods; Vulnerability / Resilience; Group Formation / Strengthening
The figure below shows an example of a community vulnerability map showing the different livelihood resources/assets and what makes them vulnerable. The process enables the community to understand how their resources can be vulnerable and put in place a plan to address the vulnerabilities to reduce the negative impact they would have on the resources they depend on.
Figure T31: An example of a livelihood’s vulnerability matrix
Livelihood’s vulnerability analysis
Step 1
Ask participants to brainstorm and identify the most important livelihoods resources for them. It may help to organise the livelihood resources or to have a checklist based on the 5 livelihood assets (or resource) classes commonly used in Sustainable Livelihoods frameworks (human, social, physical, natural, and financial) The definitions provided below are from the Brookes Livelihood Position Statement and Guidance notes.
i. NATURAL CAPITAL refers to natural resources, which includes land, soils, air, water, and all living organisms. EXAMPLE: equids, water, soil conservation for feed/fodder production, agriculture production/feed/fodder
ii. FINANCIAL CAPITAL income, savings, loans and/or other economic resources needed to meet their needs. EXAMPLE: access and availability of savings, credit/loans, livestock insurance schemes
iii. PHYSICAL CAPITAL tangible, man-made goods that support the creation of a product or service EXAMPLE: cart, harness, roads, ploughs, market shelters/resource centres, water points, boreholes
iv. SOCIAL CAPITAL is defined as what we share with others, such us our family, friends, and community as values, norms, and trust, that enable us to move developed as individuals and collectively such being in as savings groups. EXAMPLE: self-help groups facilitate working together towards collective action to produce/buy feed and at reduced cost, advocate for needs and accountability of service providers, as well as amongst community members themselves regarding their treatment of animals.
v. HUMAN CAPITAL refers to the skills, knowledge, and experience possessed by an individual or population. EXAMPLE: knowledge and skills to address the equid welfare issues identified as impacting communities’ livelihoods i.e., knowledge and skills to keep animals healthy and prevent/treat disease and death, building competencies of animal health practitioners
As this is likely to create a long list of resources, ask participants to then identify up to six resources that they consider to be MOST important in meeting their animal’s welfare needs.
Create a matrix by first listing these priority resources down the left side column of the matrix, using words, symbols, or graphics to represent the resources for all to understand.
Step 2
Next ask participants to identify the greatest hazards to their livelihoods. Hazards may be natural or man-made. It is important to be specific in the hazards, and to ensure that the issues identified are hazards. Participants may identify conditions such as “food insecurity” as hazards. Ask the group to break down these conditions to determine if they are caused by hazards (e.g., food insecurity may be the result of a drought, which is a hazard). Similarly, some groups may identify scarcity of resources, such as “lack of money”, as a hazard. In this case, it should be determined whether the lack of a resource is the result of a hazard, or in some cases, whether the resource should be added to the list of priority resources identified in the previous step.
Step 3
Once completed, ask participants to identify up to six hazards they consider to be the MOST The five most important hazards should be listed horizontally across the top of the matrix, again using symbols if necessary.
Step 4
Participants should then decide on a scoring system for assessing how vulnerable their animal dependent livelihoods are because of their livelihood resources being impacted by each hazard, identifying significant, medium/moderate, low and no impact from hazards. It is vital that all participants understand the scoring system. An example is provided below for reference:
3 = hazard significantly impacts the resource 2 = hazard moderately impacts the resource1 = hazard has a low impact on the resource 0 = hazard has no impact on the resource
Stones, symbols, or different colours of markers (e.g., red = significant risk to resource, orange = medium risk, green = low risk, blue = no risk) could also be used.
Step 5
Consider each resource in turn, support participants in discussing and agreeing the degree of impact that each of the hazards has on each of the resources. Any inconsistencies or differences of opinion should be discussed and resolved, if possible (either through discussion or by exploring the reasons for these differences and preparing more than one table if necessary).
Step 6
Discuss and analyse the results, noting different perspectives from different participants. An example is provided in the table T31.
The following questions can be used to guide the discussion but should be adopted and adapted according to the focus of the exercise.
• Are there any trends in the impact of hazards on livelihood resources? • Which resources are most affected and why? • Are there any resources that are more resistant to hazard? • What coping strategies are currently used to deal with the hazards identified? Are they working? • Are there different strategies that you would like to adopt which would reduce the impact of hazards on your livelihoods? • What resources do you have that would help you to adopt these new strategies? • What are the constraints to adopting these new strategies?
Step 7
Once complete, take a photo or record the outputs on a piece of paper. Ensure that the community has a copy for their records and facilitator has a copy for future reference or planning.
Record the actions, activities, and proposed linkages into your project action tracker, and support the community by linking them to any necessary stakeholders.
Facilitator's Notes
It can take time for people to understand the concepts and thus good facilitation will be needed to engage them.
There is need for the facilitator to be well versed with the five domain of animal welfare sufficiently prior to conducting this exercise as this is necessary to enable them to help the community identify resources important to meeting their animals' welfare needs.
Be aware that sensitive issues may not be discussed or clear to an outsider.
Local participants should be encouraged to build as much of the diagram as possible without interruption and to suggest anything else that should be recorded.
Consider having different groups based on gender, social status (re marginalized groups) when conducting the discussions.
Animal welfare conversation tool involves an open discussion about what animal welfare is and why it is important. The discussion starts by understanding how men and women and other community members view animal welfare, what they need to provide to their animals to ensure improved welfare and identifying the actors responsible for animal welfare.
Tool purpose:
Time needed:
• To improve understanding of animal welfare needs in terms of health, nutrition, behaviour, and environment. • To raise awareness and promote discussion about animal welfare issues • Understand community members’ attitudes, belief systems, perspectives and current accuracy of knowledge about animal welfare, including indicators they feel are important to their ability to understand their animals’ welfare needs
1.5 hours
Materials needed:
Cards, pens, markers, coloured powder, chalk, sticks, tree leaves, coloured cards, pictures different animal welfare conditions and or other locally available materials.
Keyword Search Tags
Project Phase: Initiation Phase, Planning Phase
Approaches for Working With Communities: Community Development Approach, Community Engagement Approach
Behavioural Drivers (COM-B): Capability
Stages of Behaviour Change: Pre-contemplation Stage
Project Support: Participatory Learning and Action Tools
Specific Topics: Animal Husbandry and Management; Animal Welfare, Feelings and Needs; Community Change Agents, Outreach and Communications, Compassion and Empathy, Animal Handling
Many factors constrain community members’ ability to improve the welfare of their animals. These may include, the Socioeconomic, cultural, and environmental conditions such as attitudes towards animals, community members’ knowledge and skills about giving care for animals, and resources and services determine the welfare status of working animals. Addressing these issues requires engaging community groups in active dialogues and social learning to discuss their animal welfare needs and to find solutions together to improve animal welfare. Figures T32 a, b, and c were images used to facilitate discussions about horse welfare needs in a community using this tool.
T32a Example of an animal with poor body condition.T32b Animal welfare umbrella representing domains of animal welfare important to meeting animals’ welfare needs
Animal welfare umbrella reinforces the fact that animals rely on people, everyone in a household, to provide care for them. In the same way, all household members rely upon healthy and happy animals to increase household members' wellbeing.
T32c Example of meeting animals’ welfare needs
Animal Welfare Conversation Tool
Step 1
Explain the purpose of the community conversations on animal welfare. Ask community groups if they have questions before proceeding.
After introducing the focus of the community conversations, facilitate a discussion about what community members describe as animal welfare.
You can prompt the discussion with the pictures in figure T32a above by asking the community members to discuss in pairs. Ensure men and women participate in the discussions separately to ensure their views don’t overshadow each other’s. Obtain feedback from a few men and women participants on the below questions:
· What can you see from the animal in image T32a? · What do you think this animal is feeling? Do you think the animal is cared for? Why or why not? · How might this image reflect the lives of animals in this community?
Using the picture in figure T32b, ask the community members to discuss this image in pairs and answer the following questions · What can you see from this image (T32b)? · What is happening to the animal in the image? What do you understand from each of the 4 domains? · How does the image reflect the animal welfare situation in this community? (General reflections/understanding on animal welfare within their community using the image)
Step 2
Facilitate a discussion around the responses received on what giving care means to men, women and youth. Take note of any additional resources people think that the animal needs. Discussion questions can include: Obtain feedback from a few men and women participants:
• In which of the images (T32a or T32b or both) do they think the animal is cared for? Why? • What is giving care to animals mean? • Is it important to help your animals feel good? Why? • What does an animal need to be happy, healthy, and productive for your family? • When your animal is not feeling good, how does this affect you and your family members? • What does animal welfare mean to you? • What do you do to care for your animals? • What are the social or cultural values related to giving care to animals? Is there any saying or expression in your community related to animal care giving?
Step 3
The next step is to take the community through a discussion which will enhance their understanding of what is needed for their animals to have a good basic level of welfare. The examples provided here can be used as a guide for the facilitator to discuss the most relevant animal welfare issues in the specific community. Use figure T32c above to facilitate the discussion using the discussion questions below:
• Thinking about your animals, what do they need from you to be happy, healthy, and productive?. • What care do animals need? Who gives this care in your household, within your community, or at your place of work? • What can you see being provided to animals in this image? Are these important? Why? Why not?
These questions will help identify the resources people think their animals need, and who the household members are who influence their animals’ welfare.
Step 4
After image T32c has been discussed, follow up by asking: “Do all animals in your household need the same things or feel the same way?” Prompt the discussion to make sure you have asked questions about: • Healthcare • Feed and water • Behaviour (human – animal interaction and behavioural interaction among animals) • Shelter/shade (depending on your context)
Step 5
After the discussion has progressed, handout the 'animal welfare umbrella', Figure T32b. Explain to the group that this image helps to convey that giving care to animals involves consideration of their health, nutrition, behavioural, and environmental needs. It is important to acknowledge that all animals need this care, and that good animal care benefits the animals as well as people. Ask participants to discuss in pairs: • To what extent are you currently able to provide each of these things for your animals? • Which of these things do you find it easiest to provide for your animals? Why? • Which of these things is it difficult for you to provide for your animals? Why? • What things on this image didn’t you know animals needed? Are any of these things new ideas for you?
After the discussions, ask for feedback from both female and male participants. The question below can be used to prompt feedback: 'What did you learn from the picture and the discussion?' Ask a few participants to share their responses and write them on a flip chart.
Step 6
Use the responses from step 5 to highlight human animal relationships. • Ask the participants to share what they think are the benefits to the animal owners and their livelihoods when the animals are provided with care as depicted in T32b?
Summarise by sharing with the group that whilst animals rely on people to provide them with the things they need, doing this well means that animals are better able to help us with the things that we need from them. If our animals are happy and healthy, they can better help us at work, at home, and in our community.
Step 7
Once the discussions are complete,take a photo or record the outputs on a piece of paper. Ensure that the community has a copy for their records and facilitator has a copy for future reference or planning.
Facilitation Notes
Identify the local term for animal welfare and consistently use the term throughout the discussion. Pay attention to differences in terms among men, women, and youth, and agree on one term.
Pay attention to differences in perspectives/understanding among men, women, and youth about animal welfare. Listen actively and probe as necessary.
Depending on the conversation topic, you can substitute other images or stories to facilitate the discussion.
You can also use this tool by focusing on one domain in one meeting (using separate meetings to discuss each of the domains) (Figure 32b) and repeating steps 4 – 7. E.g. focusing one session on behaviour you can encourage the community participants to reflect on their interaction with their animals including focusing a discussion on their observations of good and bad animal handling practices, and the impacts of these practices on both the animal and its owner/carers/handers, users and service providers. This is provided that communities are willing to meet frequently and/or prefer to focus on one animal welfare domain at a given time and have deeper conversations, reflection and learning.
Next Steps
Continue building on these initial conversations about animal welfare by supporting community members to identify their priority animal welfare issues and the individuals responsible for meeting their animals’ different welfare needs using tool T33: Community Animal Welfare Needs Analysis.
This community action planning tool supports communities in developing actions to address their priority animal welfare issues and has been adapted from Community conversation on animal welfare: A guide to facilitators [71]. This tool can be informed by outcomes from other tools such as:
Once animal welfare issues are prioritised, this tool can be used to facilitate discussions with community members to identify strategies and actions to address priority animal welfare issues, and help them identify knowledge, skills, and/or resource they required to enable them to take action to improve their animals’ welfare.
Tool purpose:
Time needed:
• Support community to reflect on their identified priority animals’ welfare issues and identify actions they can take to address them. • Identify the knowledge, skills and resources communities need to take action to improve their animals’ welfare.
1.5 hours
Materials needed:
Chart paper, note cards, markers, or other locally available resources, pre-printed pictures, or visual aids of priority animal welfare issues (optional), pre-printed pictures or visual aids on improved animal welfare practices relevant to identified animal welfare issues (optional).
Approaches for Working With Communities: Community Engagement Approach; Community Development Approach
Stages of Change: Preparation Stage, Action Stage
Project Support: Participatory Learning and Action Tools, Documentation and Reporting
Specific Topics: Animal Husbandry and Management; Animal Handling; Animal Welfare, Feelings and Needs; Animal Health and Services Community Change Agents
Community Animal Welfare Action Plan
Table T34 below shows an example of a community welfare action plan developed to address priority animal welfare issues identified through discussions using T33: Community Animal Welfare Needs Analysis.
Priority Animal Welfare Issues
Actions to be Taken (Household and / or community level)
ExpectedChanges /Indicators of Success
Resources / Support Required to implement planned actions
Who Monitors / When?
Feed shortage
Community grow fodder for donkeys
Owners then feed the donkeys the recommended portions as needed throughout the day (as donkeys do not feed a lot at once)
Improved donkey health indicators: • Increased feed volume available • Feed available in all seasons • Improved body score condition • Happy and productive animals
Fodder production requires seeds.
Training on fodder production and storage
Improved understanding of donkey feeding best practices e.g. what types of feed, when/frequency of feeding, and how much to feed
Owners do the monitoring monthly
Animal welfare team assessing body score condition quarterly
No access to veterinary services (for preventative treatment and prevention)
Community mobilization based on scheduled vaccination/ deworming programs.
Owners supported by each other to seek veterinary services whenever their donkeys are sick.
Owners vaccinate donkeys on recommended schedule
Improved Health Indicators: • Reduced incidence of donkey’s sickness • Reduced time lost by owners due to animals being unable to work
Animal health providers have access to vaccinations.
Information on how to identify illness in donkeys and when they should not be worked
Owners assessing how their animal is feeling if it is sick or not daily, while ensuring that the animals are vaccinated yearly
Donkeys have access to water
Owners provide their donkeys with water at regular intervals during the day
Improved donkeys’ health indicators: • Improve body score condition/ health • Improve hydration
Access to safe drinking water for donkeys
Daily monitoring of donkeys status, if its thirsty or okay by the owners.
Table T34a: Example of Completed Community Animal Welfare Action Plan
Work with the community to rank 2-3 of the most important issues one by one. T8 Pairwise Ranking and Scoringor T9 Matrix Ranking and Scoring can be used to support identification of priorities, or results from these activities may be used if previously conducted.
You can prompt the discussion with prep-prepared outreach materials if you have developed them to discuss possible actions for improvement and benefits of acting. An example is provided in figure T34(a) of how to go about manging wounds that you can refer to develop any other animal welfare issues you need to help the community to plan to address (refer to the steps for cleaning wounds in figure T34a as an example).
Step 2
Hand out the pre-prepared outreach materials (pictures or illustrations), illustrating the selected priority animal welfare issues, and ask community members to discuss them. Ask: what do you think about and what feelings do you have when you think about taking steps to improving these animal welfare issues? If communities struggle to answer this, you can use the steps below to prompt this conversation if helpful:
• Step 1 - Observe: Look at the animal shown and identify the welfare issue it is facing. (For example, the image illustrates an animal with wounds.) • Step 2 – Question: Ask yourself, what could an animal in that condition be feeling or experiencing? (E.g. Anxiety, confusion, struggle, pain, distress.) • Step 3 – Reflect: What do you think needs to be done to address the animal welfare issue shown? Do you currently have all the things you need to address the welfare issue? Do you need assistance in sourcing something to help address this animal welfare issue from somewhere else? • Step 4 – Discuss action: What could you try doing to address this animal welfare issue? (Such as cleaning the wounds using the available material within the household, such as salt and water). If these actions turn out to be successful – great. If they don’t – you will reflect and adjust the plan.
If you have prepared outreach materials on solutions to the animal welfare issues in advance, hand them out and discuss them for consideration (refer to the example on Figure T34a on wound management).
Step 3
Ask community members to share what they would do to manage the wound issues in step one in their animals. Or you can remind participants of the first prioritised animal welfare issue from the ranking exercise the community previously completed duringT33: Community Animal Welfare Needs Analysis .
Ask community members to share what they could do to address/respond to this priority animal welfare issue. Probing questions to guide this conversation include:
• Is there someone in the community who already responds to this animal welfare issue well? What do they do, to do this well? • What can be done at the household and community level to respond to this animal welfare issue? • What are the challenges that people face to solve this issue? • What are the benefits of acting on this animal welfare issue? • What are the potential costs or constraints to acting on this animal welfare issue?
Make notes of responses onto flipchart paper. Repeat Step 3 for each of the priority animal welfare issues previously identified by the community
Step 4
Use community reflections from Step 3 as prompts to facilitate completion of a community animal welfare action plan. Facilitate a discussion to identify the following key elements:
• Which prioritised animal welfare issues are community members committed to addressing at this point in time? (Not every animal welfare issue needs to make it onto the community action plan, if community members are not committed to addressing it yet). • What are the actions they realistically commit to taking (at both household and community level) to respond to the selected animal welfare issues? • What are the expected changes (indicators of success) that the community would like to see from their actions? • What resources and support do they require to implement these actions? • How/who will monitor whether these actions have been taken and when?
Document the plan into the community animal welfare action plan table (see example in Table T34a). Ensure that the community are left with copies of the plan in a language/format appropriate and requested by them. Finally, record the community discussions and their agreed actions into your Project Action Tracker
Facilitator's Notes
Ensure that as a minimum the following key elements of a community animal welfare plan are agreed by the community during this exercise, using participatory and gender aware facilitation:
What are the priority animal welfare issues community members are committed to addressing? E.g. some priority issues might have been identified, but there isn’t true commitment from the community yet for addressing these.
What are the actions that participants can realistically commit to taking (at both household level and community/group level) to address selected priority issues?
What are the expected changes/indicators of success of their actions?
What resources and support to they require to implement these actions?
How/who will monitor whether these actions have been taken and when? Be realistic.
Communities will likely require further support and input from you/other organisations in order to implement their action plans. It is vitally important that during the community action planning session you are clear with community participants about what it is realistic and appropriate for you and other organisations to provide, and that you ensure these provisions are sustainable. If a request doesn’t fit these requirements, explain this to the participants and help them to develop a more suitable request.
Next Steps
To support community members in implementing their action plans, it will be important to resources and support identified by community members as needed to implement their action plan are secured, and you may need to consider holding meetings with other relevant stakeholder e.g., local government officials, animal health and resource providers to secure their support as needed.
Community Score Card is a widely used citizen’s led accountability tool. It is a highly participatory tool that allows community members and the service providers or local government agents who have a duty to provide services to collaboratively assess the quality of service provision. There are various services animal owning communities may rely on to support them in meeting their animals’ welfare needs, including: animal health services, equipment makers, feed sellers, extension agents etc. This tool can be used to promote constructive dialogue and joint action amongst communities and respective service providers to improve services important to meeting animals’ welfare needs. The tool is designed to be used with a specific service provider and one issue at a time so as to enable meaningful discussion and action.
This tool can be used to further support discussions about animal service and resource providers including as a follow-up to activities such as: T1A: Mapping Resources and Services, T3A. Local Animal Service Provider Venn Diagram, and T9 Matrix ranking & scoring, or T9B Matrix Ranking and Scoring of Animal Service Providers. Through these activities, community members will have identified the local animal health or resource service providers they rely on, discussed their satisfaction or preferences, as well as identified criteria they use to judge their local service providers competence and/or satisfaction with services which can provide a useful foundation for informing use of this tool. In addition, if you conducted T5: Gender Roles and Responsibilities, referring to this may help you develop discussion questions and facilitate discussion amongst community members about different opportunities and constraints faced by men and women in their interaction with different local service providers.
Tool purpose:
Time needed:
• Identify gaps and levels of satisfaction in local animal service provision in terms service quality, availability, affordability, accessibility and adaptability • Promote shared understanding amongst community members and local service providers of common issues and solutions related to service provision and use • Improve accountability and motivation to improve animal service provision and use amongst local animal service providers and community members. • Support identification of indicators for assessing service quality and user satisfaction, and participatory monitoring of local animal health service quality and improvements. • Improve dialogue, feedback, and collaborative working between local animal service providers and communities,
2 hours for community scoring; 2 hours for local service providers self-evaluation scoring; 2 hours for a joint interface meeting. Time may be shortened to 4 hours if the community scoring and local service provider self-evaluation scoring is conducted simultaneously
Materials needed:
Chart paper, coloured sticker dots and/or coloured markers, coloured index cards or sticky notes, meeting halls to post papers for scoring.
Keyword Search Tags
Project Phase: Planning, Implementation, Exit and Evaluation
Approaches for Working With Communities: Community Development Approach
Behavioural Drivers (COM-B): Behaviour Change Diagnosis and Planning
Project Support: Participatory Learning and Action Tools, Monitoring and Evaluation, Documentation and Reporting
Specific Topics: Animal Health and Services
Community Scorecard Process
As this tool is about a service provider and the animal owning communities who are using such services, it is important to properly layout the process with adequate care to have a negotiated and empowering results both for animal owning communities and the service providers. Focusing on one service provider at a time removes confusion and to properly identify gaps and recommendations.
Some of these processes can be done simultaneously. The community scoring, the service providers own scoring and the joint interface meeting between the animal owning communities and respective service providers can each take 1.5 to 2hrs. It can be scheduled all in one day or can be done in consecutive days. If you have enough facilitators the animal owning scoring and the service providers scoring can be done simultaneously giving enough time for both facilitators to have a reflection time in between to help them frame the agenda and leading the interface meeting.
If you want to find the views of vulnerable members of the community, you can hold separate sessions with them. So you can make any number of animal owning communities scoring separately and bring the scores together for the interface meetings. (E.g. you can have a women only, youth only, or a specified community group members’ organization, etc.) The essence is to help you understand the perception and the real barriers for them in relation to their lived experience with the LSPs and the kind of services they provide including how they interact with them.
Figure T35: Community Score card processes adapted from [90]
Community Score Card Process
Step 1
Plan and Preparation The first step is to do the preparatory work to the community score card process for the identified service.
Input tracking and planning the process. This includes who gets to be part of this process (identifying key stakeholders from both community and service providers side) and make logistical arrangements like meeting halls, scoring materials, scheduling for the meeting; and allocating separate rooms if the community scoring and the service providers scorings are going to take simultaneously.
When identifying community members that will participate, organizers need to ensure that vulnerable community members understand the community score card process; and enable them to understand and encourage their participation. It is critical to take into consideration that different segments of the community participate and an enabling environment is created for them to share their views in a safe space whereby each of their individual views and scores are taken into consideration, and their experiences valued. At times, depending on the context and the culture as well as preference by the vulnerable groups, separate sessions could be organized for them to do the community scoring. If separate meeting halls or times need to be set up for women and men groups, ensure this is already planned and agreed with the community or have an additional conducive meeting hall/space for both meetings.
To ensure community participation, it is important to create an enabling space and demystify fears around participation for fear of retaliation by service providers and/or local government bodies.
Step 2
Mobilizing community, developing the performance scorecard and scoring
Start by explaining the purpose and process of the exercise and then ask participants (from the community members) to identify the parameters of good quality service (depending on the animal welfare local service identified to be focused on).
This must be an empowering process for communities. Therefore before the actual scoring, it is important to have preparatory sessions with communities by providing appropriate information about the purpose of undertaking community score card, their rights and expectations from the service providers; and the roles and responsibilities of the service provider that is in focus. The discussion needs to be focused on the connection between the service provision and why lack of or limitation in the identified service exacerbates the animal welfare issue; and what quality service looks like and how it will benefit them in addressing animal welfare problems/issues. This is to help them to be focused on the service provider and the quality of service that is relevant to address the animal welfare problem. It is important to have a properly facilitated session to enable them to share their expectation of the kind of quality, affordable service and their satisfaction as clients who own equines.
Limiting Indicators and Prioritizing among them: It helps to have a limited set of indicators that represent the different aspects of quality service. In case that more indicators are suggested, it is important to try to categorize them and create an understanding on the amended indicator. If coming to amending them is not possible, then it might be good to prioritize which criteria to use depending on the issue at hand. Either way, it is important to note the discussions generated during such discussions.
As the literacy level of community members could be mixed, it is important that you be prepared to provide support to them by reading it for them and reminding them what the scoring rates are (whether using smiley faces, or using rating scales in a way they can understand). The scoring should be properly explained and repeated to community members when each of them come to do the scoring so that there is a clear understanding on that among all. Facilitators need to have locally made scoring materials (beads, beans, etc.) or cut out some sticky materials (e.g. dots, etc.) - enough for all participants to score per each identified scoring criteria, and with clear scoring definitions. If such materials are not available or if writing on flipchart is easier, then it is important to do each of the members' scoring and write it down immediately.
Once the individual scoring by each community member is done, discuss among them the potential reasons/justifications for such scoring. Based on the scoring and the discussion, prioritize issues that are pertinent to them, and the kind of solutions they are proposing. The prioritization will help if and when the scoring by the service providers list is different and if the need to narrow down to a maximum of 10 indicators are going to be the focus for the joint action planning, then it will help you to easily identify and take the first top 5 issues for the joint meeting. Include these proposed recommendations for each of the issues, or put them in a separate sheet whereby you will be able to easily refer to/use them during the interface meeting.
Step 3
Developing and scoring the self-evaluation scorecard by respective service provider
It is best practice to focus on a single service provider to make the discussion and scoring more focused. Start by explaining the purpose and process of the exercise and then ask participants who are service providers to identify the parameters of good quality service (depending on the animal welfare local service you have identified to focus on). It is ideal if the facilitator knows and has overall understanding regarding the role of the service providers regarding equine welfare needs, the legal/policy and implementation frameworks that guide the kinds of service the service provider need to provide and the equine owning community’s main concerns regarding the service.
Before jumping into indicator selection by the service provider participants, it is good to brainstorm first on their overall roles and responsibilities to shape the discussion and the indicator selection to focus on their type and quality of service provision. (E.g. is it only to do treatment or are they mandated to provide education or follow up etc. as part of their role, etc.) Such discussion will help to make the discussion and the scoring comprehensive as much as possible.
It is ideal if the facilitator that leads this process needs to have an overall understanding of the service providers’ roles in the animal welfare improvement and the kind of services they provide,
It is good to create an understanding with the service providers (whether they are public/government or private service providers) on the reason for doing and process of community score card. It is good to reiterate that it is to create a smooth interaction for joint action and monitoring of progress with their stakeholders, who are equine owning communities. The discussion should not result in making them feel cornered or be defensive; rather this process needs to also be empowering for the individual service providers. If there are female service providers, ensure that their views and challenges in discharging their roles to provide quality service is also captured during the indicator identification, scoring and recommendation generation.
Depending on the literacy levels of the service providers, it is suggested that facilitators have alternative scoring materials available to accommodate literacy levels as needed (beads, beans, etc.), or have some stickers or similar materials (e.g. dots, sticky notes etc.) in sufficient quantities to support scoring of all identified criteria by all participants. Facilitator may need to read the scoring criteria out loud during the scoring process depending on participant literacy levels.
Once the individual scoring by each community member is done, discuss among them the potential reasons/justifications for such scoring. Based on the scoring and the discussion, prioritize issues that are pertinent to them, and the kind of solutions they are proposing. Include these proposed recommendations for each of the issues, or put them in a separate sheet whereby you will be able to easily refer to/use during the interface meeting.
Step 4
Interface meeting to develop action plan
Ensure that you have ample space to accommodate both community and service providers, and that it is a safe place for all to be. Facilitator(s) need to go through the indicators and scorings, with the commonality and the unique indicators identified by respective groups, the level of score, the prioritized issues and the recommendations before the meeting to structure the meeting with a feedforward mentality.
Start the discussion by reiterating the purpose of doing the score card and the need for this interface meeting. As one of the purposes is to create a shared understanding among community and service providers for a consultative dialogue to generate joint recommendations and action plans, set the meeting tone with that. Display the scoring of both groups so that each of them see the indicators they have identified and the scores they have provided.
Start with a brainstorming session and explore and focus on the common themes to start the discussion. The spirit of the discussion is to get to a common understanding and focus on what can be done in the future. Hence, ensure that both groups present their findings and why they think the issues they have identified are critical. Through the discussions, ensure there is no blame game rather an understanding on the constraints both communities and service providers face, and frame the issues for them to tackle together.
Next write down the prioritized and consensus reached issues/problems to be tackled jointly or separately but will be monitored together. If consensus cannot be reached, it is good to give individual participants a chance to identify what is a priority for them through scoring on the key issue that is important for them. Ensure that illiterate participants’ interests are catered for as stated in step 2 and 3 above.
Once the issues are prioritized, use the below template/table to document the discussion. As much as possible ensure that the issues identified by equine owning communities and the service providers are captured and joint solutions are sought for them. Indicate who the responsible groups are to champion/lead on prioritized issues to be tackled and try to outline clear steps/actions and when that can be delivered.
Step 5
Implementation and Monitoring of Recommended Actions
Once an agreed action plan is drawn, it is good to show commitment to follow up on the agreed action points. As some of the action plans might need the two groups to work within their own constituencies (e.g. equine owning communities might need to work in their groups, or service providers might need to do an internal budgeting/planning, customer service training to their service provider members, etc.), try to ensure that they follow through their respective action plans as well as help them monitor their joint and constituency-based action plans progress together as a joint taskforce. The purpose of this step is to ensure that agreed joint action plans are implemented and monitored together to improve the service provision as well as bridge the understanding/expectations of equine owners’ on the quality of service.
As part of monitoring, once the agreed action plans have been undertaken, it is possible to do another round of scoring to assess the progress from the initial scoring. Following this is equally important to this is also to celebrate successes as well as organize a similar process of community score card if issues identified are addressed and/or if there are still constraints that need to be further dealt with. The initial and the follow up scorings need to be documented to show progress, stagnation or regress on the quality of service. Moreover, the plenary reflections and the action plans notes need to also be captured and distributed to the equine owning community/groups, the service providers and the joint taskforce (if a separate entity is formed) for their records, future reference and/or action planning. Add a copy to your Project Action Tracker and Community Action Plan Template note on quality of service provision and the services rendered by service providers.
Facilitator's Notes
It is your responsibility as a facilitator to ensure adequate understanding is created among all involved stakeholders about the purpose, process and spirit of this tool in advance. (It is to facilitate conversations rather than shifting blame and pointing fingers)..
It is recommended this activity be administered by a trained community facilitator to ensure discussions result in agreement on joint action plans.
This tool is not only about capturing results, but rather is a process orientated approach that empowers communities, facilitates conversations and dialogue between communities and service providers.
It is important to ensure vulnerable and excluded members of the community are aware of the process and how it will help them to voice their concerns when it comes to being able to access, afford and enjoy quality service provision without explicit or tacit discrimination.
Depending on the issue at hand and the time and convenience of setting the meetings, discussion with the community and discussion among service providers can take place simultaneously before the joint session. However, if the community, service providers are done separately it is recommended there be a time gap in scheduling before reconvening for the joint session. This will enable facilitators to summarize points and identify potential sticky and tricky areas for joint reflection and recommendations for potential actions for consideration during the joint session.
It is useful to examine perceptions of animal-related resource and service providers with different groups in a community as they may rely on, or have different perceptions of resources and service providers. Consider asking both men and women from animal-owning households to participate in this activity; or if it is not feasible or appropriate to conduct this activity with both sexes together, consider conducting this activity separately.
Facilitators could ask probing questions when indicators are identified by animal owning communities as well as during the local service providers own self-scoring to encourage people to think about how the identified indicator relates to the local service provider and animal welfare.
Facilitators should not control or insert their ideas into the community or service provider assessment or scoring process, but rather facilitate the process so that people feel free to do their individual scoring. In contexts with participant illiteracy or where assistance is required, facilitators can provide support by reiterating the assessment criteria to use when it is time for them to do their scoring.
Next Steps
Information on resource and service provider gaps identified using this tool if conducted during the initiation or planning phase of a project, can be helpful to refer to during community action planning discussions.
