Final Draft. Review of the Process of Implementation of the Uganda Participatory Poverty Assessment Project (UPPAP)

Transcription

1 Final Draft Review of the Process of Implementation of the Uganda Participatory Poverty Assessment Project (UPPAP) Jenny Yates June 2000 Prepared for: Oxfam GB in Uganda PO Box 6228 Kampala Tel. (256 41) / Fax (256 41) and The UPPAP Ministry of Finance, Economic Planning and Development PO Box 8147 Kampala Tel. (256 41)

2 Acknowledgement and Disclaimer I would like to thank all those that gave their time so generously to discuss the process of implementation of the UPPAP for this review. This review was commissioned by Oxfam GB in Uganda. The views expressed in the report are not necessarily agreed or accepted by Oxfam GB or the UPPAP, or by any other organisation / institution referred to in the report. 2

3 Contents Acronyms Executive Summary v vi 1. Introduction 1 2. Methodology 2 3. Process of Design, Implementation and Dissemination to Date Why UPPAP? Growing Concerns About Poverty in Uganda The Development of Participatory Poverty Assessments Origins of the UPPAP Taking Shape Formulating the Project Proposal and Establishing Objectives Study Tour to Tanzania Desk Study of Previous Participatory Studies of Poverty in 9 Uganda 3.3 Putting Plans into Practice 9 4. Influences on Policies, Relationships and Understandings National Level Influence on Government Policies Influence on Donor Policies Influence on Relationships between Civil Society and 20 Government Influence on Understandings and Attitudes International Level District and Community Levels Collection of Information Influences at District Level Influences at Community Level Success Factors, Constraints and Problems in the UPPAP 24 Process 5.1 National Level Success Factors / Constraints in the Design Process Success Factors / Constraints in the Implementation Process Success Factors / Constraints in Dissemination and Influencing District Level Community Level 32 3

4 6. Lessons and Recommendations from the Process Review Lessons for the Future Development and Management of the 35 UPPAP Management of the UPPAP Dissemination of the PPA Results Lessons for the Next PPA and Linking Planning for this to Establishing Capacity for On-Going Participatory Poverty Monitoring after the UPPAP Lessons of the UPPAP Process Applicable to Contexts Outside Uganda References Annexes Annexe 1. Annexe 2. Annexe 3. Annexe 4. Annexe 5. Annexe 6. Annexe 7. Terms of Reference for the Process Review List of those Consulted for the Process Review Stakeholders in the UPPAP Process The First PPA Research Agenda Status of the Community Action Plans (CAPs) Views from Communities in Kapchorwa and Bushenyi Districts on the UPPAP Partnership Agreement Between the MFPED, Oxfam and the Implementing Partners for the PPA 4

5 Acronyms ACFODE: CAP: CAS: CBR: CDRN: DFID: DPO: DPU: DRT: DNA: EPRC: EU: GoU: HIPC: IDS: IMF: LC: MISR: MFPED: MoLG: MPED: NGO: PAG: PAF: PEAP: PEWG: PPA: PPM: PRA: PRSP: SIDA: UBOS: UPPAP: UNHS: UNDP: UPE: WDR: Action for Development Community Action Plan Country Assistance Strategy Centre for Basic Research Community Development Research Network Department for International Development of the UK Government District Population Officer District Planning Unit Development, Research and Training District Needs Assessment Economic Policy Research Centre European Union Government of Uganda Highly Indebted Poor Countries Institute for Development Studies, University of Sussex, UK International Monetary Fund Local Council Makerere Institute of Social Research Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development Ministry of Local Government Ministry of Planning and Economic Development Non-Governmental Organisation Poverty Assessment Group Poverty Action Fund Poverty Eradication Action Plan Poverty Eradication Working Group of the MFPED Participatory Poverty Assessment Participatory Poverty Monitoring Participatory Rural Appraisal Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper Swedish International Development Agency Uganda Bureau of Statistics Uganda Participatory Poverty Assessment Project Uganda National Household Survey United Nations Development Programme Universal Primary Education World Development Report of the World Bank 5

6 Executive Summary Objectives of the UPPAP The Uganda Participatory Poverty Assessment Project (UPPAP) is a project of the Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development (MFPED) of the Government of Uganda (GoU). It seeks, through participatory consultations in poor communities, to bring the perspective of the poor into national and district planning for poverty reduction. Oxfam GB is the implementing agency, working in partnership with district authorities, Ugandan NGOs, academic institutions and donors. Objectives of the Process Review The purpose of this review is to document, analyse and learn from the process which UPPAP has followed to date, in order to share this experience with a range of audiences (governmental, non-governmental and academic) at both national and international levels. The report seeks: to provide a clear record of the process through which the UPPAP has been designed, implemented and managed to date; to identify the limitations and constraints of the process adopted; to highlight those lessons relevant to the future development and management of the UPPAP, and lessons applicable to contexts outside Uganda. Research for the review included analysis of key documents, interviews with stakeholders (officials in the MFPED and in two districts, staff of the UPPAP and Oxfam, donors, researchers and directors from institutions involved in the UPPAP implementation), and group discussions in four communities where participatory research has been carried out. As far as possible, the review seeks to reflect the perspectives of those who contributed and to present multiple perspectives. Policy Context and Origins of the UPPAP The Ugandan economy has been growing at an average of about 6% per annum since However, from the early 1990s, concerns grew that the benefits of economic growth were not trickling down to the poor. These concerns led, from the mid-1990s, to formidable efforts by the GoU to identify through consultations key areas for poverty reduction, to direct government resources to these areas, and to try and monitor and ensure that resources are used as intended. These efforts have included the formulation of a Poverty Eradication Action Plan (PEAP); the development of Sector Investment Plans; the establishment of the Poverty Action Fund; and the opening up of the Budget Process. The UPPAP should be seen as both fitting within these on-going efforts to reduce poverty by the GoU and contributing to them. From the early 1990s, the World Bank promoted the implementation of Participatory Poverty Assessments (PPAs) in borrower countries. At the same time, a wide range of NGOs in Uganda had been using participatory methodologies in the design of their work and in policy analysis. With protest and concern at the perceived failure of economic growth to deliver poverty reduction in Uganda and new methodologies being promoted to consult the poor on the nature of poverty and priorities for its reduction, the ground was ripe in Uganda for a PPA (Director of a NGO participating in the UPPAP). Experience of participatory consultations in poor communities in two districts, carried out in 1997 to inform the World Bank s Country Assistance Strategy, convinced government officials that a large-scale PPA in Uganda would further the development and monitoring of the GoU s poverty policy. Assisted by World Bank and DFID officials, they began to develop the idea and lobby for a PPA within the GoU. 6

7 Preparations included review of the experience of other PPAs and a study tour to Tanzania. These preparations showed that while previous PPAs had generated valuable lessons for policy and its implementation, there had often been limited use of the findings. Therefore the decision was taken that the UPPAP should not be a one-off exercise but a three-year process designed to link findings to policy through GoU ownership and the involvement of key policy makers at national and district levels. Key Activities to Date The UPPAP got underway in mid The first year s activities involved a PPA in 24 rural and 12 urban communities in nine of the 45 districts of Uganda. Sampling for the PPA was purposive, informed by the UPPAP s objective of understanding the nature and causes of poverty. The district that ranked lowest on a range of criteria (such as ranking in the human development index, exposure to natural calamities, degree of civil strife etc.) was selected from each of Uganda s seven agro-ecological zones. Two districts were added to the seven purposively sampled: Kampala, as the national capital and a location of urban poverty, and Bushenyi, as a district where considerable socio-economic progress has been made and findings might be expected to shed light on how households and communities have moved out of poverty. The PPA was carried out by nine implementing partner institutions in collaboration with district authorities: five NGOs with experience of participatory and/or socio-economic research, three social policy research institutions, and the Uganda Bureau of Statistics in order to build links between the UPPAP and the Uganda National Household Survey. The research took place in three cycles, with workshops to promote learning and analyse findings between each cycle. The second year focussed on using the findings of the PPA for policy influencing and dissemination at national and international levels. Inputs were made to the 2000/2001 GoU budget formulation process and to the development of the Plan for the Modernisation of Agriculture, while the findings were widely disseminated through their inclusion in the high profile Uganda Poverty Status Report produced by the MFPED in Consultations were also carried out with district authorities on their capacities in poverty focussed planning. In this, the third year of the project, dissemination and follow-up will take place in districts and communities, and planning will be carried out for a second PPA, likely to be conducted in The UPPAP implementation process is therefore only just over halfway through and many of the processes and relationships that it has catalyzed are only just getting going. Influence of the UPPAP Findings: national level The findings of the first PPA have had a significant and important influence at the national level in Uganda. They have influenced a number of government policies. By highlighting key causes of poverty not drawn attention to in the PEAP (insecurity, poor governance, lack of information on rights and entitlements) they prompted a revision of the PEAP and contributed to the GoU s decision to develop a National Information Strategy. The finding in so many research sites that lack of safe water is a key problem for poor people led to an increase in funds allocated to improving water supply in the districts in the 2000/2001 budget of 368% compared to the 1999/2000 allocation. At the same time, by showing that the causes of poverty vary across the country, the PPA has prompted more dialogue between the MFPED and district authorities on conditions on grants to the districts. 7

8 Influence of the UPPAP Process: national level The process of implementing the UPPAP has also established new relationships and led to new understandings, with many positive results. The experience of working with NGOs in the UPPAP has boosted the acceptance by the MFPED of civil society and reduced suspicions on both sides. This assisted civil society organisations to make a strong input into the revision of the PEAP. Combined with the government s new readiness to recognise aspects of poverty (isolation, hopelessness) drawn attention to in the PPA and new causes, this dialogue between the GoU and civil society organisations has, in the words of a senior government official, widened the consensus on where we want to go on poverty reduction. Recognition within the MFPED of the utility of the PPA findings has brought former skeptics on board and led to a commitment in the MFPED to make participatory poverty monitoring in Uganda an ongoing process that will continue beyond the life of the UPPAP. Influence at District and Community Levels It has been much harder for the UPPAP to engage with the district authorities and impact at the district level has been limited so far. At the community level, research for this review found positive influences in all communities visited, resulting from participation by community members in the exercises used in the PPA and from dialogue with the researchers. At the same time, the research for this review and other available information reveals that the PPA raised expectations in communities of assistance from the UPPAP to solve problems identified in the PPA. Lack of follow-up has resulted in great disappointment and some resentment. Success Factors and Constraints Analysis of the success factors of the UPPAP process shows the key importance of the involvement of senior government officials, the partnership in implementation between government, donors and Oxfam and the strategic use of the UPPAP s limited resources to maximise input to policy processes. Major constraints include the lack of a clear management structure and failure at the community level to communicate clearly the UPPAP s objectives and role in follow-up to problems identified in the PPA. The involvement of so many implementing partners in the UPPAP is seen by key stakeholders to be both a success factor and a constraint. It has led to learning, sharing, networking and the building of relationships between government and civil society. But it has added to the complexity of managing the project and fragmented capacity building for participatory research in Uganda, so that as yet, the UPPAP has not achieved its objective of establishing capacity for on-going participatory poverty monitoring in Uganda. Lessons and Recommendations In terms of lessons, for future management of the UPPAP, examination of the process to date highlights the need for the Management Committee to exercise its responsibility for decision making and for the UPPAP secretariat to facilitate this through consulting on, considering and then presenting key issues to the Committee. For the dissemination of the PPA findings to districts and communities that is currently being planned, the research for this review points to the need to sell the positive impact of the PPA to district authorities. Regarding communities, it points to the need for limited assistance from the UPPAP to follow-up problems identified during the PPA, using existing district structures for disbursing funds where possible. For the next PPA, the process review highlights the need to consider carefully how this can be used to establish the basis for the on-going participatory poverty monitoring in Uganda to 8

9 which the MFPED is now committed, for a realistic timetable for implementation, and for establishing clearly what the PPA is trying to find out. In addition, many detailed recommendations come out of the review for the planning and implementation of the next PPA and these are drawn attention to in the report. For contexts outside Uganda, the UPPAP process highlights the benefits of government ownership and the involvement of senior policy makers. It emphasises the need to consider the pros and cons of involving a large number of institutions in the process of implementation of the PPA and the necessity of a clear management structure. It highlights that it is essential to decide whether follow-up in communities to problems the research identifies is feasible, and to prepare carefully how to explain clearly in poor communities what the PPA is about. 1. Introduction The Uganda Participatory Poverty Assessment Project (UPPAP) is an initiative of the Government of Uganda (GoU) that seeks, through participatory consultations, to bring the perspectives of poorer Ugandans into the process of formulating and implementing district and national policies. The GoU has demonstrated strong commitment to poverty eradication, and has developed a Poverty Eradication Action Plan (PEAP) as the framework for achieving this. Through the UPPAP the GoU seeks to go further, by broadening the process of poverty analysis and monitoring already taking place. Originally designed to last three years, the UPPAP is a project of the Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development (MFPED). Oxfam GB is the implementing agency, working in partnership with district authorities, Ugandan NGOs, academic institutions and donors. The objectives are as follows (MFPED 1997: 4): Enhancing knowledge about the nature and causes of poverty and generating and applying strategies for poverty reduction. Enhancing district capacity to plan and implement poverty reduction strategies using participatory methods. Developing systems for participatory and qualitative poverty monitoring. Establishing capacity for participatory policy research in Uganda. The UPPAP got underway in mid The first year s activities involved participatory poverty assessments (PPAs) with 24 rural and 12 urban communities in nine districts of Uganda. The second year focussed on using the information obtained for policy influencing, dissemination of findings at national and international levels and consultations with district authorities on their capacities in poverty focussed planning. In this, the third year of the project, dissemination and follow-up will take place in districts and communities. Further PPAs will be conducted in The process is therefore only just over halfway through and many of the processes and relationships that it has catalysed are only just getting going. The purpose of this review is to document, analyse and learn from the process which UPPAP has followed to date, in order to share this experience with a range of audiences (governmental, non-governmental and academic) at both national and international levels. A mid-term review of the project as a whole was completed at the end of While that review looked more generally at the performance and impact of UPPAP to date, the purpose of this exercise is to focus more specifically on the process through which UPPAP has been designed, implemented and managed. The specific objectives of this review are as follows: 9

10 a) To produce a clear and factual record of the process through which UPPAP has been designed, implemented and managed to date. b) To identify the limitations and constraints of the process adopted, as well as its critical success factors, including the policy environment and institutional context, in terms of their impact on the achievement of UPPAP s objectives. c) To highlight those lessons which are i) relevant to the future development and management of UPPAP, and ii) applicable to contexts outside Uganda, in such a way that these lessons can be easily communicated, understood and applied. 1 This report is organised around the objectives of the review. It begins by providing a record of the implementation of the project, relating this to the policy environment (section 3). The influence to date of the UPPAP findings and process are then discussed in section 4. Section 5 reviews the success factors and constraints of the process so far. Lessons and recommendations for the future management of the UPPAP and for the development and implementation of PPAs in other countries are drawn out in section Methodology of This Review The first phase of the process review was a desk study of the main documents of the UPPAP to date. Semistructured interviews were then held with key stakeholders in the project at the national level: staff of the UPPAP and Oxfam, officials in the MFPED, donors, researchers and directors from seven of the nine institutions that implemented the PPAs in Academics outside Uganda who have provided technical assistance to the UPPAP were contacted and their comments on the process requested. Two districts were then visited. District officials and researchers were interviewed and group discussions held in four communities where PPAs were undertaken. In total, 31 individual interviews were conducted, seven group discussions held and written comments received from eight people. This research on the UPPAP process took six weeks. A list of all those consulted is given in Annexe 2. As far as possible, this review seeks to reflect the perspective of all the participants and to represent multiple perspectives. While personal interpretation is of course inevitable, the analysis relies heavily on ideas provided by participants. 3. Process of Design, Implementation and Dissemination to Date 3.1 Why UPPAP? Growing Concerns about Poverty in Uganda The Ugandan economy has been growing at an average of about 6% per annum since However, from the early 1990s, concerns grew that the benefits of growth were not trickling down to the poor. NGOs sought to raise poverty up the political agenda by lobbying for debt relief to free up resources for social sector spending and commissioning studies on poverty at the local level. 2 Opposition politicians, the press and NGOs maintained that poverty was actually increasing and the poorest were getting poorer. A senior official in the MFPED 1 The Terms of Reference of the review are given in Annexe 1. 2 For example, the study commissioned by Oxfam, ActionAid and SNV from CDRN (Oxfam / CDRN 1996). 10

11 interviewed for this review referred to the cascading gossip that the poor were getting poorer. In 1995, at the government and donor Consultative Group meeting in Paris, these concerns were discussed, and it was officially recognised by both sides that economic growth is a necessary but insufficient condition for poverty reduction. President Museveni declared the overall goal of government to be poverty eradication, and directed the preparation of a strategy to achieve this. As a result, a task force was formed through the then Ministry of Planning and Economic Development. 3 Working groups involving national and district government officials, representatives of employers and workers organisations, NGOs, and academics reviewed government policy in areas from macro economic policy to agricultural production to health policy to poverty monitoring (Oxfam 1997). However, Kakande (1998) notes this consultation was not comprehensive as it omitted the poor themselves! The work led to the production by the task force of the Poverty Eradication Action Plan (PEAP), formally approved by government in June It is important to note here that the formulation of the PEAP was just the start of a formidable effort by the Ugandan government to direct its resources to key areas for poverty reduction, to consult about what these key areas are, and to try and monitor and ensure that resources are used as intended. The UPPAP should be seen as both fitting within this effort and contributing to it. The PEAP and the other major measures taken by government to make its policies propoor are therefore described briefly in the box below. On-Going Efforts by the GoU to Use its Resources to Reduce Poverty 4 The PEAP is a national planning framework. It is envisaged that the PEAP will be revised every two years, in order to ensure that it accurately reflects government s priorities at any one time, and the first revision took place in An explicit goal in its formulation was to identify strategic areas where increasing budget allocations would lead to poverty reduction, and since its inception the PEAP has been the major guide to the allocation of resources. Its major areas of focus include: creating a framework for economic growth and transformation (measures to maintain macro economic stability, encourage private sector investment); measures to increase the ability of the poor to raise their incomes (support to infrastructure development, financial services for the poor, agricultural advisory services etc.) ; measures to improve the quality of life of the poor (support to health and education provision, provision of clean water etc.); measures to improve governance and accountability. To ensure that government priorities as set out in the PEAP are translated into resource allocations, the GoU introduced the Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF). The MTEF spells out a three-year programme for the utilisation of resources across and within sectors. Sector Investment Plans were then needed. Kuteesa writes: Given the MTEF process and the need to focus on PEAP, it became imperative that each Sector develop a strategic overall plan concerning the allocation of recurrent and development resources within the identified priorities for a specified period. Education, Health and Agriculture have already developed their Sector Investment Plans, while other Plans which are under preparation include Law and Order, Roads, Accountability and Water. The plans show how the various sectors will allocate their resources (as determined by the MTEF) to priority areas within the sectors to maximise the impact on poverty reduction. The UPPAP findings have influenced the focus of some sector plans, particularly the plan for Agriculture. Of course the Sector Investment Plans also follow from the gradual move amongst bilateral donors away from project support to more general budget support. To further improve transparency and accountability in the allocation of resources, the GoU has also opened up 3 The Ministry of Planning and Economic Development (MPED) merged with the Ministry of Finance in late 1997 to form the Ministry of Finance, Planning and Economic Development (MFPED). 4 The information in this box is mainly taken from Kuteesa (2000). 11

12 the Budget Process. During the 1998/99 budget preparation, sector working groups were formed with members from the line ministries, the private sector, NGOs and donors, to recommend priority areas for resource allocations to reduce poverty. To ensure the integration of the UPPAP findings in the 2000/2001 budget consultation process, the Poverty Eradication Working Group was also established, to review each Sector working group paper for poverty focus (see section 3.3. on use and dissemination of the UPPAP findings). Budget documents are made public: before final approval of the Budget by cabinet, an abbreviated version is published; the Background to the Budget is made available, a cabinet policy document giving background on expenditure priorities; the MTEF is made available. Efforts are also being made to assist the districts to improve their budgeting and planning processes they are being required and supported to develop their own MTEFs, sector priorities and work plans. At the same time, efforts are being made to ensure transparency and accountability at the local level. For example, announcements are made in the press indicating the amounts disbursed to each district by sector. In the education sector, budget allocations for each school are placed on school notice boards. The MFPED also established in 1998/99 the Poverty Action Fund (PAF), to channel additional resources from debt relief under the HIPC initiative to priority areas for poverty reduction, as determined overall by the PEAP priorities and as determined in more detail by the Sector plans and budget consultation process. The PAF has also received additional bilateral donor support. PAF resources disbursed to line ministries and districts to fund the established priorities cannot be reallocated to other areas. The major beneficiaries under the PAF are: Water and Sanitation, Primary Education, projected to increase by more than 25% on 1999/2000 levels and Primary Health Care, projected to increase by more than 80%. Both civil society and government officials are involved in the monitoring of the PAF outlays, with quarterly meetings to discuss delivery against budget allocations. Monitoring of the impact of the government s efforts on poverty reduction also takes place through the Poverty Monitoring Unit of the MFPED. This collates quantitative and participatory data on poverty from both government and non-government sources for the purposes of feeding it into policy formulation. UPPAP is situated within the same department of MFPED as the Poverty Monitoring Unit and the links are strong (Bird and Kakande 2000). In 1999, the Unit produced a highly influential and hard hitting Poverty Status Report, bringing together the findings from the national household surveys conducted by the Uganda Bureau of Statistics, the UPPAP and other studies in Uganda to assess progress against the original objectives of the PEAP and to identify key challenges facing Government in tackling poverty (ibid). Publication of the report played a major role in the GoU s decision to revise the PEAP in (see section 3.3.) The Development of Participatory Poverty Assessments Participatory Poverty Assessments are a relatively new methodology. They are an attempt to use participatory techniques mainly from the Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) tradition, originally developed for use in the design of development projects, for macro level poverty analysis and policy influencing. They are designed to complement, test and inform the results of conventional poverty analysis that uses data on household income and consumption from questionnaire surveys to define who is poor. 5 PPAs have been pioneered and promoted by the World Bank from the early 1990s, as part of the Bank s Poverty Assessments (PAs), which must be carried out to inform the Country Assistance Strategy (CAS) for each borrower country. 6 At July 1998, the Bank had conducted 43 PPAs, and one half of PAs conducted included a PPA in that year (Robb1999:15). 5 A poverty line is established, based on the level of income or consumption necessary for a minimum acceptable level of nutrition and other necessities of everyday life. People are considered poor if their income falls below this line. (Robb 1999: 4, referring to World Bank 1991.) 6 In 1992, the Bank indicated that poverty assessments should be conducted in all borrower countries and feed into each CAS, with the objective of analyzing the nature and causes of poverty and developing a strategy for poverty reduction (Robb 1999:2). This was part of efforts in the Bank to move poverty reduction to the fore in its agenda, this having been overshadowed by the focus on economic adjustment to achieve macroeconomic stability in the 1980s. A CAS lays out the Bank s programme of support for a country in relation to its development objectives and structural conditions. In May 1996, senior management issued a directive stating that poverty reduction must be at the centre of each CAS (Robb 1999:45). 12

13 However, PPAs typically involve a wide range of institutions. Not surprisingly, those PPAs where the government of the country concerned has had a high degree of ownership and control, have been most successful in terms of actually influencing policy. PPAs have used a variety of participatory tools to systematically consult poor people in both rural and urban communities on, typically, their understanding of nature and causes of poverty, their access to and views on the quality of basic social services, and their priority actions for poverty reduction by government, NGOs or in the communities themselves. They have been found to enrich the understanding of poverty gained from traditional household surveys. In particular, they have drawn attention to the multidimensional nature of poverty, explained processes of impoverishment and proved useful in explaining anomalies in household survey data. The characteristics of an average PPA are given in the box below. Characteristics of PPAs Cost $75,000 - $125,000 Sample Size communities Time taken to undertake survey and analysis 5 9 months Composition of research team Nationals of country, half men and half women, ability to speak local languages, representatives from various ethnic groups and a cross-section of age groups. Typical agency conducting the field work Government extension workers, local and international NGOs, academic institutions, independent consultants / firms. Examples of donors who have contributed to DFID, World Bank, ActionAid, Oxfam, UNDP, UNICEF, government PPAs DANIDA, Asian Development Bank. World Bank (2000) Origins of the UPPAP With protest and concern at the perceived failure of economic growth to deliver poverty reduction in Uganda, and an exciting new methodology being promoted to consult the poor on the nature of poverty and priorities for its reduction, the ground was ripe in Uganda for a PPA (Director of one of the implementing partner NGOs in the UPPAP commenting on its origins). Some of those interviewed for this review, stressed that a PPA was a comfortable way for the Ugandan government to deal with the political pressure it faced to justify its policies. A senior official in the MFPED also indicated that if it [a PPA] had to be done, we thought, let s do it ourselves. However, all those who gave views on the origins of the UPPAP also stressed the genuine commitment of the Ugandan government to poverty reduction and to consultation and participation in policy formulation. An official in the World Bank commenting on why there has been support for the UPPAP within the MFPED noted: This government is different. It realises the value of change. The person who realises that is the President. The actual idea arose during a World Bank CAS consultation. In 1996/97, the World Bank in Uganda was preparing its CAS. It wanted both to base this on the PEAP and to carry out some participatory work to inform its strategy. Focus group meetings were organised in two districts, Kabale and Soroti, in which first district officials, and then groups of villagers were asked to brainstorm on the causes of poverty, rank these problems, propose solutions and carry out a budgeting exercise to apportion limited resources between hypothetical government programmes. Officials from the MPED and DFID participated in these exercises together with World Bank staff. While the exercises revealed the same basic priorities as the PEAP, the officials involved were struck by the ability of the villagers consulted to analyse and prioritise a wide range of issues and generate well reasoned strategies to address problems of poverty. They were also conscious that although the formulation of the PEAP had involved wide ranging consultations, it had not involved direct consultations with the poor. 13

14 Thus the officials involved conceived the idea for large-scale PPA in Uganda, and began to develop the idea and lobby for it within the MPED. And the fire took off (comment from World Bank official involved in the design of UPPAP). 3.2 Taking Shape: March 1997 May Formulating the Project Proposal and Establishing Objectives The formulation of the proposal of the UPPAP and the establishment of its objectives was undertaken by the small number of committed individuals at the national level, from the MEPD, DFID and the World Bank. UNDP, Oxfam and CDRN also became involved. Preparatory activities and consultations A number of activities were undertaken in an attempt to get others on board, and to develop the objectives and strategy: Attempts were made to learn from the PPAs already carried out in Ghana, Zambia, South Africa, Kenya and Tanzania. This review of past experience showed that while previous PPAs had generated valuable lessons for policy and its implementation, there had often been limited use of the findings. Therefore the decision was taken that the UPPAP should not be a one off exercise, rather A three year process was thus designed, which incorporated processes to link the findings both with central and with district level policy making (Bird and Kakande, 2000). Meetings were held in the MFED to which senior officials were invited, for example, those on the PEAP Task Force and from the Statistics Department. 7 A workshop was also convened in Kampala in August 1998, attended by representatives of line ministries, international and Ugandan NGOs, donor agencies and research institutions (MFPED 1997:6). However, key stakeholders interviewed for this review stressed that many senior government officials remained skeptical about the utility of conducting a PPA, due to doubts about the reliability of qualitative data. 8 Indeed some key individuals in the MFPED did not come on board until as late as mid-1999, when the initial results of the research started to come out and were seen to be useful. Oxfam was approached to be the implementing agency, due to the feeling that community level work would be best undertaken by a NGO with experience of participatory techniques. At this time in Uganda, relationships between government and NGOs were not as developed as today indeed the UPPAP has played an important role in breaking down suspicions and creating links. However, Oxfam was acceptable to the MPED due to its work on debt, through which it had formed a collaborative relationship with government (Oxfam 1998). As a respected British agency, Oxfam was also acceptable to DFID. This was important in securing substantial funding from DFID for the UPPAP a much higher level of funding than DFID had provided to previous PPAs. Oxfam raised reservations about its involvement on the basis that this would not lead to the creation of on-going capacity for participatory policy analysis within Uganda, and sought to involve a local partner, the Community Development Resource Network 7 The Statistics Department became the semi-autonomous Uganda Bureau of Statistics in The idea that participatory methods generate qualitative data is very common, although in fact they can be used to collect quantitative information. 14

15 (CDRN). In turn, CDRN, lobbied for the inclusion of community action plans (CAPs) as part of the participatory research. These interventions led to the idea (put forward in the project proposal) that the implementing agency would seek principally to develop the capacity of one Ugandan NGO to undertake participatory policy research (MFPED 1997: 8, 11). They also led to a reference in the project proposal to the possibility of the CAPs, although this idea was not in any way developed at this time (see MFPED 1997: 4, 9). Two district workshops were held, in Kibaale and Kotido with participants from the District administrations, lower tiers of the council system and local NGOs (MFPED 1998:6). At these workshops, a World Bank video of the PPA in Tanzania was shown, and attempts made to elicit views on how a PPA could be useful at the district level. However, it proved difficult to get the idea of a PPA across to participants. A key motivation in convening these workshops was consciousness on the part of those involved in designing the UPPAP that, in the context of Uganda s decentralised system of government, findings needed to be relevant to the district as well as the national level. Consultations with districts did not go further, however, or include the Ministry of Local Government (MoLG) at this stage. This was due to pressure of time - during the 1997 design phase, it was envisaged that the UPPAP could produce results in time to influence the 1998/99 budget. It was also due to the assumption that exactly what would need to be done in terms of district capacity building would be best worked out on the basis of the experience of the first phase and the relationships developed. Definition of objectives and funding On the basis of these consultations, the overall objective of the UPPAP was defined: To bring the perspective of the poor into national and district planning for poverty reduction (MFPED 1997:2), and the four specific objectives formulated (see Introduction for these objectives). DFID prepared the project proposal with a total budget for three years of 723,055, of which DFID undertook in 1997 to provide 533,650, with UNDP and the World Bank expecting to confirm funding of the remainder during project implementation. 9 In terms of the relative importance attached to the objectives by key stakeholders, when interviewed about what they hoped to achieve or gain from the UPPAP, key donors noted that their primary interest was in getting a better understanding of the nature and dimensions of poverty to inform their strategies and the PEAP. Key government officials stressed their interest in finding out what the poor think government should be doing i.e. the major interest of key stakeholders has been in obtaining information for national level policy, not in district capacity building, and certainly not in community level action. The activities of the UPPAP to date reflect these priorities. Time-frame As noted above, these objectives were to be achieved over a three-year period. The first year would concentrate on carrying out a national PPA with communities in nine of the 45 districts in Uganda. It was expected that this would provide information to revise the PEAP and to inform the budget process. In the second year it was envisaged that at a national level, dissemination of the findings would continue, while within the nine districts, the findings of 9 At 1 May 2000, the UPPAP had actually cost 565,611 (excluding some costs met by UNDP and DFID directly). It expects to spend a further 327,816 from May 2000 April An important development is that the GoU has started funding the UPPAP, contributing Ushs 100 million (about 40,000) in the GoU financial year (July June) as well as non-cash support worth 26,503, and budgeting a further Ushs 100 million for financial year The World Bank has so far committed 142,870. The Swedish International Development Agency (SIDA) also started funding the UPPAP from early

16 the research would be followed up and activities undertaken to sustain the use of participatory methods to inform planning of the priorities of the poor. In the third year of the process a second national PPA was planned (Bird and Kakande 2000). As the UPPAP has slipped behind schedule, it has come to be seen as having three Phases: Phase 1: the first PPA and dissemination of the results at national and international levels. This took nearly two years instead of one as originally envisaged (mid-1998 early 2000); Phase 2: work at the district level (early ); Phase 3: a second PPA (likely to be implemented in 2001 with planning in 2000). Research agenda The areas to be explored by the first PPA were defined as follows (MFPED: 8): local concepts of poverty, vulnerability and relative well-being in poor rural and urban communities; livelihood strategies of the poor and the ways in which they respond to external shocks such as drought, conflict and stress, what people in poor rural and urban communities see as the most important problems and concerns in their lives at present, how these have changed over the last ten years and expectations for change in the future; local views of the rural and urban poor on access to, quality and relevance of services (health, education, water/sanitation, transport, agricultural support, justice, information); opinions on local governance structures and strategies for improving accountability; identification of areas the poor themselves see as the most effective actions for poverty reduction which can be taken by individuals or families, communities, government agencies, other institutions. The first PPA did explore all these areas, while an important addition to the research agenda was the inclusion of discussion with people on their awareness of particular government policies, their opinion of their impact and their recommendations for reform. 10 It should be noted that including research into governance structures and views on improving accountability on the agenda of the PPA was very innovative. Most PPAs have looked only at views on government services. Staffing and technical support Regarding staffing and technical support, the implementing agency was expected to employ a coordinator, a book keeper and a programme officer and to employ local researchers as required. The MEPD undertook to provide two full time staff and administrative support. It was expected that international technical assistance would be required for particular activities and would be provided by the Institute of Development Studies (IDS), University of Sussex. Management arrangements In terms of management arrangements, a Technical Committee was established by the MPED at the end of 1997, with the objective of building consensus around the objectives of UPPAP and providing technical inputs to guide implementation. Chaired by a senior official in MEPD, this had fifteen members, drawn from government (the MPED, the Ministry of Gender and Community Development, the Decentralisation Secretariat), donors (DFID, UNICEF, UNDP, World Bank), research institutes (the Makerere Institute for Social Research, the Economic Policy Research Centre), the implementing agency and NGOs 10 The government policies the researchers discussed with participating communities included: Universal Primary Education, Decentralization, Entandikwa Credit Scheme, Land Act, Primary Health Care, Civil Service Reform, Demobilisation, Liberalisation of Agriculture, Decentralisation. 16

17 (Oxfam, CDRN, the Uganda NGO Forum). It was envisaged that the UPPAP would report to this committee, and through this to the Poverty Monitoring Steering Committee the overall policy making body for poverty monitoring in Uganda (MFPED 1998: Annexe 3). However, it is important to note that there was no real clarification in the design phase or in the project proposal of who would really be responsible for decision making. Complexity of the UPPAP It is also important to note that due to the ambitious scope and novelty of UPPAP in bringing the perspectives of the poor into national and district planning the project was and remains very complex. This is reflected in the huge number and diversity of stakeholders (literally those with a stake in the project) in the UPPAP. These are listed in Annex 3. As potentially every poor person in Uganda has a stake in poverty reduction the number of stakeholders runs into the millions and as a result the number of institutions representing these people is also very large. These institutions range from Central Government Ministries, to local Government bodies, to NGOs, to international donors to the communities themselves. An important subset of these is of course the individuals and institutions directly involved with the UPPAP process: MFPED, donors, implementing partners, district authorities, and from early 2000, the MoLG. With the plethora of linkages between these diverse stakeholders, with each having their own cultures, capacities, motivations and expectations, and without a clear decision making structure, it is not surprising that the project has been a very complex one to manage. Further adding to the complexity is the fact that the UPPAP design and proposal deliberately established strategic directions rather than detail of anticipated activities. It was understood from the beginning that the course of the UPPAP was likely to be unpredictable and would be influenced by and respond to the rapidly changing policy environment and institutional context in which it was situated (Bird and Kakande, 2000). Those involved in the project design interviewed for this review stressed these points, noting that the UPPAP has been a learning process for those involved, and we are not through with designing it Study Tour to Tanzania Members of the Technical Committee visited Tanzania in early 1998 to further review and learn from the experience there of undertaking a PPA. Participants were struck by the lack of ownership by the Tanzanian government. Interviewed for this review, a donor commented: we saw the PPA [report] gathering dust on the shelves and therefore came back determined to make our PPA work. We wanted a country process that would go beyond identifying the perceptions of the poor to utilizing their information for advocacy and policy, and an official in the MFPED noted we identified that the missing link in Tanzania was the involvement of policy makers. We saw that if the UPPAP were to influence policy, government needed to be at its centre Desk Study of Previous Participatory Studies of Poverty in Uganda This was undertaken in February March 1998, and discussed at a workshop in April. This identified gaps in the research that the UPPAP should seek to fill, for example, few studies had looked at trends in poverty or the seasonality poverty, and it emphasised the need for comprehensive participatory study of poverty in Uganda. In terms of the process of the previous research, the Desk Review emphasised that most of the 56 studies reviewed had been extractive, aiming to collect information from communities, rather than impart skills and empower the community to analyse their own situation and to generate solutions (McClean and Lwanga-Ntale, 1998: 71). It therefore recommended the need for community empowerment and for developing do-able solutions as one of the key issues for UPPAP to consider during the implementation phase of the project (ibid: 6). Key stakeholders 17

18 interviewed for this review reported that they were struck by this recommendation and that this influenced them to include the exercise of making CAPs in the PPA. 3.3 Putting Plans into Practice A summary of the main activities of the UPPAP is given in the table below. In the boxes that follow, the key stages and decisions in the implementation of the UPPAP are then explained in detail in broadly chronological order, although it should be noted that some of the stages overlap. 18