“Disease management of animals is a problem” Stanley, one of the area leaders said in response to my question about the weaknesses field workers perceive in the Child Aid Project. All 11 area leaders and both Project Council Leaders sat in a semi-circle crowded in a room in the DAPP office. I was facilitating an analysis of the strengths, weaknesses threats and opportunities of the Child Aid Project in Kapiri Mposhi with them.
This type of analysis is called SWOT (Strengths, Weaknesses, Threats, and Opportunities). It’s a very common business management tool. It can lead to strategies that can be integrated into planning to improve future outcomes of businesses, projects or programs. I wasn’t surprised that disease management was a problem.
Just a few days before, I participated in a review meeting for community veterinarians that DAPP trained with the help of Wilfred, the government veterinarian. Several of these community vets admitted that many people in their areas weren’t building proper shelters to protect their animals from diseases. They also complained that people weren’t respecting their authority as community vets so it was difficult to persuade them to do anything.
I’ve been reading a book called The Critical Villager by Eric Dudley about the mindset of villagers and how they receive and act on new ideas. One of his arguments is that villagers aren’t empty vessels eagerly waiting to learn and adopt new ideas. Villagers are more like skeptical scientists he says. Villagers won’t just change their behavior because someone tells them too. They might not understand the message that someone is saying, feel shamed by that someone or not respect that person’s authority.
One possible reason that some Village Action Group (VAG) members active in the project aren’t building shelters to protect their animals from disease is that they don’t understand the purpose of the shelter. Villagers haven’t understood the main idea that the shelter will prevent their animals from having diseases. Maybe to them, their animals are usually fine so they don’t see the need for it. Another I see is that the authority of the community veterinarians isn’t being recognized by some villagers because the role of a community veterinarian doesn’t make sense to them. They don’t trust the volunteer community vet’s accreditations.
Another problem may be the quality of instruction VAG members are receiving. Based on my observations from a review session on livestock management with Community Agricultural Committees (CACs) responsible for training VAG members, CACs are lacking knowledge on animal care. If even these CACs are self-admittedly lacking knowledge, I assume the VAG members they’re responsible for training aren’t receiving the best instruction.
On top of the lack of knowledge that exists, just today the Program Officer mentioned casually that VAG participation is dwindling. What’s the reason? VAG members were recruited by their fellow community members with promises of tractors, hammer-mills and cattle. None of these items are being distributed by the Child Aid Project and apparently no one from DAPP was disseminating that message. The potential for miscommunication between people is huge just like that game of broken-telephone that continues to amuse children in Zambia and Canada alike.
Reading Dudley’s book is making me re-think how people change their behaviors and I have many new questions. What knowledge did the community members receive in livestock management? What knowledge have they retained? How could project evaluation determine the reasons people aren’t taking care of their animals? How can DAPP encourage people to take preventive actions to protect their animals from disease so they won’t default on pass-on loans? Above all, I’m recognizing that the informational pamphlets I’m working on coordinating will be a very small contribution in the complex process of behavior change.
2 comments:
WOW
Some really heavy stuff in the last two posts. What I'm wondering is, if the volunteers self-admittedly have little knowledge of animal care, why are they instructing others on it? How are the volunteers trained, and wouldn't it make more sense just to train the farmers in the same way or by the same people? Also, maybe there's a connection between the lack of knowledge of the training volunteers and the villagers lack of respect for the volunteer vets. How are they trained for their positions? Are they fully qualified veterinarians, or only trained for common diseases or infections with the animals used in the program? Just a thought. Great work, it sounds like you'll have a lot to offer the project by way of observations and ideas.
The volunteers in the Agricultural Committees do know some things about livestock management. In fact, their knowledge is supposed to be better than the Village Action Group members which they train during meetings every month. The pamphlets on livestock management that I’m assembling with the help of Mr. Silwimba, the government veterinarian should help fill the knowledge gap that currently exists. The Agricultural Committees do currently have some information on livestock management in Village Action Group manuals but it is the basics so they were requesting more knowledge.
As for the community veterinarians, they are separate from the Agricultural Committees though they are supposed to work together. The community veterinarians are trained by Mr. Silwimba on how to vaccinate and de-worming livestock. They are also supposed to encourage people to take preventative measures to protect their animals from disease. The field workers in DAPP Child Aid Kapiri Mposhi complain, however, that there are not enough community veterinarians. It may therefore help that greater access to knowledge on the care for livestock exists in the form of a pamphlet. The lack of respect for community vets comes from the better educated villagers who don’t want to trust someone who has just been trained for a few days and would rather take advice from a vet who has gone to veterinary school.
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