N2+Discussion+on+Livelihoods+work+6+Oct+2010


 * Meeting with Don, Amare and Katherine on Livelihoods aspects of N2 6/10/2010**


 * Don described his think piece on livelihoods. Looking at the impact of interventions on livelihoods and also the need for being endowed with various capitals before farmers can engage in interventions.
 * Could develop an intervention catalogue. One page per intervention – how does the intervention contribute to water productivity? Could involve web-based platform which displays the impact on the various livelihood capitals. Could lead to “livestock-water bright spots” type publication. Could test this in study sites using case studies say with a few farmers in focus group discussions.
 * Look at demand side aspects of production. E.g. an intervention could be mini-tractors to reduce the need for feed being used for traction. Also could the role of cattle as walking banks could be reduced through development of robust local financial institutions.
 * Need to keep in mind the local cultural context – livelihoods framework often doesn’t take account of cultural context. This can constrain adoption. Need to look carefully about where things have been adopted and work out why.
 * Starting point is to sit with communities to work out what their constraints and goals are. Important that water productivity is central to goals of farmers otherwise we are working in the wrong communities
 * Katherine talked about her plans. Wants to do a more thorough assessment of what the livelihoods are in the study sites. Looking at drivers of people’s behavior – constraints/goals. Looking at where adoption has worked and why?
 * Could use Amare’s Fogera adoption study as a starting point. Land certification was a major issue for adoption
 * Katherine: Institutional aspects – what kind of local institutions (ways of people organizing themselves) exist and how do they link with formal/govt structures?
 * Need to develop an inventory of interventions – for livestock but also for crops and trees. Need to agree a framework. Amare could develop a template – description of intervention, target commodity, impacts on water productivity/livelihood capitals/upstream downstream effects.
 * Question of whether we as a project actually implement interventions or do we do this at arm’s length through LPA’s. Could work at transforming the process of planning interventions to make it more participatory.


 * Chronology of activities**
 * Amare (with Don) to develop inventory of interventions
 * Draft template and circulate to IWMI and ICRAF by Oct 15
 * Baseline document on key characteristics of livestock system (feeding, health, use of CPR)
 * One characterization exercise needs to be conducted for livestock, crops and trees. Need to share the idea – gather ideas on what kind of information needs to be collected. Could be group interviews backed up by some random interviews for triangulation. Could get some census data from previous WB LSMS (living standards measurement survey). Katherine to develop ideas in the next couple of weeks. Alan to share our recent OPEC survey.
 * Amare has been developing concept notes for characterization – students could go deeper e.g. hh survey, PRA. Management strategies, feeding strategies. Could be combined from different partners to come up with some more holistic projects. Amare to share drafts in the next few days.

Alan Duncan