Experience Sharing from the South Kordofan Rural Development Programme in The Sudan: Building the Capacities of Development Partners

Programme Objectives

1. There is a growing consensus that a major cause of armed conflict in The Sudan is the lack of development. Accordingly, the South Kordofan Rural Development Programme (SKRDP) is supporting the peace process through post-crisis rehabilitation and development. The programme’s main objective is to achieve sustainable improvements in the living standards of smallholder farmer, pastoralist and women-headed households by ensuring food security and providing social services in a safe, community-managed environment. Its strategy is to enable rural communities, local government and civil-society organizations to manage their resource bases efficiently. SKRDP will sponsor and support partnerships, encouraging other international financiers and agencies to channel assistance for essential social and community infrastructure through a decentralized and participatory framework established by the programme.

2. The programme’s target group includes smallholder farmers, pastoralists and landless migrants (both men and women). Poverty targeting will rely on a two-step approach: targeting of poorer villages, then targeting of poorer households. The poorest represent approximately 30% of rural households in the area, and 260 villages are considered poor. Targeting will also take into consideration mechanisms to ensure the successful realization of programme objectives and to safeguard the properties of the selected communities and localities.

Social and Economic Characteristics of the Programme Area

3. The programme is implemented in all rural areas of the state of South Kordofan, which covers an area of approximately 88 000 km2. The state is composed of five governorates (Abou Jubaiha, Al-Rashad, Dilling, Kadugli and Taloudy), and includes 16 rural and three urban locality councils. Its estimated population is 1 096 000, of whom 51% are women. Some 77% of the province’s population are rural people living in 1 500 villages or village clusters. The number of households in each village ranges from 50 to 500, depending on the availability of water and social services.

4. Since the mid-1980s most areas of South Kordofan have been affected by civil war. The province’s security situation has, however, improved during the last two years. The negative impacts of the war are reflected in the deteriorated social fabric, the growing rates of migration, the increase in woman-headed households and the breakdown of infrastructure.

5. The province’s rural population suffers from severe poverty, with an average annual income of USD 145 compared with a gross national product of USD 290. The rural population can be divided into three socio-economic categories:

• relatively well-off households (about 20% of the rural population), which depend on horticultural and mechanized agricultural activities and cotton plantation;
• medium-income households (50%), which depend on traditional agriculture and farm plots of 10 feddans (10.38 acres) or more; and
• poor smallholder farmers engaged in traditional agricultural activities, and migrants (30%).

Women’s Involvement in the Programme

6. The programme components are:

• agricultural extension and smallholder services;
• livestock production and rangeland management;
• community support services;
• rural financial services; and
• institutional strengthening

7. Although the programme has no specific component for women, women’s involvement in all programme activities is substantial. Activities related to women have been incorporated in the programme’s main development activities, such as agriculture, range management, business enterprises and rural financial services. To ensure women’s effective participation, the programme has adopted an implementation strategy that:

• involves women in the main programme development activities at village and household levels by encouraging their representation in all grass-roots and other institutions central to the programme;
• enhances women’s productive capacities through training in on- and off-farm productive activities and development of home economics skills;
• assists women in improving household living standards by facilitating their access to credit from formal financial institutions such as the Agricultural Bank of Sudan, which has allocated 15% of its loans to women; and to credit and savings services from informal financial institutions, such as village revolving funds, which the programme has helped to set up;
• provides basic service facilities (such as potable water points) that benefit village women and children, and trains health workers; and
• supports women’s participation in decision-making and conflict-mediation processes at village and household levels.

8. The number of women beneficiaries participating in each activity depends on how relevant the activity is to them and how it can help them to improve their livelihoods, as determined through discussions with both men and women in the local community. So far, from 30 to 50% of women in the area have participated in programme activities, either as board members of village development committees or in separate women’s committees. Given their roles in agricultural production and animal husbandry, women as well as men are trained as local community extension agents and para-veterinarians.

9. SKRDP ensures that women participate in programme activities and have access to programme services by:

• recruiting local- and ministerial-level women extension agents (who have easier access to rural women that their male counterparts do);
• recruiting a women development adviser to work with programme management, extension staff and community development committees to improve the programme’s outreach and impact on women;
• specifically referring in all contracts with national experts (e.g. for studies, consultancies or training courses) to the need to take women’s needs and resources into consideration;
• requiring men and women extension agents to raise community awareness of the importance of involving women as active participants and beneficiaries of programme activities;
• providing financial resources for training of all field staff (men and women) on the rationale, objectives and methods of working with women in a way that is relevant and sustainable;
• conducting community needs assessments that analyse the division of labour, resources and benefits between women and men, and that identify women’s and men’s priorities in the agricultural sector;
• developing a programme strategy for effectively working with women, based on the findings of the community needs assessment; and
• developing a sex-disaggregated monitoring and evaluation system that tracks programme activities and their impact on the economic and social conditions of women and men.

Focus on Strengthening Partners

10. SKRDP is being implemented by relevant local agencies (including the provincial Ministry of Agriculture, Livestock and Irrigation (MALI)), the localities, the Agricultural Bank of Sudan and the village development committees. Each partner implements specific tasks related to its mandate, and obtains specific technical support from the programme.

11. Four provincial MALI units are closely involved in the programme: the women’s development unit, the training unit, the information and communications unit, and the extension and research unit. Together these units form the extension department. SKRDP supports these units through building maintenance, provision of office equipment and vehicles, training, technical consultations and feasibility studies. MALI is responsible for establishing an effective extension network at community and village levels; providing technical assistance to the locality extension teams and village extension agents in all development areas; supervising various training courses for extension teams, extension agents and beneficiaries; supervising women activities and their participation in the programme’s major development activities; documenting programme activities; and providing the audio-visual aids needed for training courses and social services. These activities enhance the effectiveness of MALI’s core functions, which involve the provision of agricultural, livestock and rangeland services; the use of mechanized agriculture; and the implementation of research activities in coordination with farmers in all localities. The focus on equitable targeting of women and men is also building MALI’s experience in analysing and responding to women’s needs holistically.

12. Within SKRDP, the locality represents the basic unit for the implementation of programme activities. So far, the localities have mainly played an administrative role, but their capacities will be developed so that they can play an active developmental role within the context of the programme, enhancing household living standards and incomes, and providing sustainable services to constituents. To enable localities to perform this role, an extension team was established in each of the five selected localities. The teams are composed of at least a team leader, and a man and a woman extension agent. SKRDP has funded extension facilities, vehicles and equipment, training, staff salaries and allowances, and operations. Under the supervision of the heads of the localities and SKRDP, extension teams in the localities have the following tasks:

• supervise the selection of villages and rural communities to be included in programme activities;
• engage communities through social mobilization and help form beneficiaries’ organizations (village development committees), supervise their training and provide orientation so that they can perform their development roles more effectively;
• prioritize development interventions and facilitate development planning with the communities concerned;
• develop links among the village development committees and interest groups, formal financing institutions, government administrations, and local and international voluntary organizations;
• refer disputes that arise among village beneficiaries to assigned mediators; and
• disseminate general and specific extension publications on SKRDP.

13. To ensure that locality-level extension teams take into consideration the needs, resources and roles of women and men, all team members receive training on gender issues and their relevance in the local context.

14. Village development committees, women’s development subcommittees and women’s interest groups carry out the programme activities agreed upon and prioritized by the communities. These committees facilitate programme implementation and community participation, and manage beneficiary training. The size of development committees varies according to the population density in the village, but they normally consist of 10-15 members. As decided by the local communities, at least one third of the committee members are women. The duties and responsibilities of the village development committees are to:

• identify community needs and kinds of services and facilities required;
• mobilize human and financial resources to respond to local needs;
• operate and maintain the required social facilities;
• manage grants provided by the SKRDP to each community; and
• ensure the sustainability of the development activities supported by SKRDP and other organizations.

15. Interest groups are formed under the umbrella of the village development committees following community mobilization campaigns. These groups include farmers’ groups (both men’s and women’s), and women’s interest groups (which focus on specific women’s and children’s issues). Training of members, especially women members of interest groups, is crucial for the groups’ effectiveness and sustainability. SKRDP therefore provides support for building social centres that can host training courses for women and group meetings.

16. SKRDP has a subsidiary agreement with the Agricultural Bank of Sudan for the management of the rural credit component. The programme has supported the Agricultural Bank of Sudan by financing the reopening of a branch office in the city of Kadugli; by supplying vehicles for mobile banks at the branch offices of Abu-Jubaiha, Dilling and Kadugli; and by appointing a rural credit expert to establish the procedures for implementing rural financial services.

Challenges Facing SKRDP

17. For a decade, the state of South Kordofan has been the site of emergency and relief operations as a result of armed conflict and drought. This has led communities to expect and demand ‘quick relief’. In this context, the programme approach of community participation and self-reliance needs to be constantly clarified and discussed, and mutual responsibilities clearly defined. This requires that development practitioners at locality and ministry levels fully understand and clearly communicate the programme approach and its rationale.

18. Because of the province’s wide geographical area and its poor road conditions (particularly during the rainy season) many villages are isolated. This makes start-up and support of activities particularly time-consuming, and emphasizes the need for a better road and water drainage network.

19. The localities are the essential units for programme implementation, and yet they are weak in terms of managerial capacity, financial resources and basic equipment. SKRDP is engaging in intensive dialogue with the Government to ensure that the agencies are provided the administrative, financial and material support they need to perform their designated roles. The programme also needs to continue training these agencies, helping them to analyse the realities of their constituents in a gender-sensitive manner and to respond to existing constraints and opportunities.

Main Lessons Learned

20. In remote areas, characterized by dispersed settlements and poor road infrastructure, SKRDP adopts a two-pronged strategy: first, it establishes a network of relevant organizations that work in partnership to improve rural livelihoods; and then it invests in building the capacities of organizations that are most accessible to the local population, such as village development committees and the localities. The institutional analysis conducted during programme design was fundamental in the articulation of this strategy.

21. Programmes with a strong capacity-building focus require technical expertise and investments in human resources. Recruitment of qualified staff went smoothly in SKRDP. Indeed, the decentralization of the programme’s administrative structure, and the existence of higher education institutes at provincial level meant that there was a pool of qualified women and men to recruit from for the positions of extension agents at both locality and ministerial levels. In The Sudan, thanks to support from bilateral, multilateral donors and international non-governmental organizations, several organizations are available to provide training, technical assistance and consultancy services on participatory and gender-sensitive community development approaches. SKRDP has developed procedures for reviewing, selecting and contracting national expertise to build the capacity of local partners.

22. Working in remote areas with dispersed settlements makes transport a fundamental tool of service delivery and follow-up. Vehicles should be secured before field activities begin so as to avoid any interruption of the community mobilization process, especially after preliminary contacts are made with the beneficiaries and their grass-roots organizations.

23. Programmes do not require a specific women’s component or a specific women’s development team to ensure outreach of programme services to women. Implementation of SKRDP has shown that working effectively with women to improve their economic conditions is a team effort. For this effort to be successful, all team members need to understand why community development requires the effective participation of both women and men; they need to acquire skills in analysing women’s and men’s roles, resources and needs; and they need to discuss appropriate responses with community members.

Date: April 2002

Contact Information

Ms Asma Ali Galdagon,
Women’s Development Officer,
South Kordofan Rural Development Programme,
Central Coordination Unit of IFAD Projects
Tel: 00249 11 771474 Fax: 00249 11 777169
E-mail: ccuifad@sudanmail.com