In a system of rational land use, sustainability considerations would ideally be incorporated into any development proposals at an early stage so as to minimise the risks of land degradation. This is seldom the case. Project interventions of a conservation nature are normally instituted only after degradation has set in and decreasing productivity is evident. Soil conservation projects and programmes have therefore typically been rehabilitative or restorative.
Soil conservation and related activities can form the primary purpose of a project. They may also figure as components of a project with wider development objectives. There are different viewpoints as to the relative merits of dealing with land degradation through broad-based agricultural/forestry development programmes as opposed to narrowly focused soil conservation projects. While actual experience has todate been varied, many past soil conservation projects, usually planned by outside technical "experts" on a top-down basis, were too narrowly focused. They all too often involved little more than the construction of runoff control structures in conjunction with limited technical land management recommendations. Invariably these were undertaken with little if any consideration of the farming systems and wider development context in which they were to be implemented. Hence where there is a need and justification for a specifically focused soil conservation project, tackling land degradation, it needs to fit within a wider framework and not be designed as a separate and unrelated exercise.
The primary objective of agricultural development projects is usually increased growth of agricultural output. For those targeted at the problems of small-scale farmers the emphasis is generally on relatively short term (i.e. within the life of the project) production-oriented project interventions. The interventions are directed at increasing farm productivity so that the project beneficiaries can better meet their immediate household welfare needs for food, fuel, shelter and cash.
The primary objective of soil conservation projects had been to reduce soil loss with project interventions typically focusing on the control of runoff and erosion. SARM requires a broader holistic approach. Hence when seeking to combat land degradation at the small-scale farm level, its objective should be increased adoption of land use enterprises and farm management practices that are both productive and conservation-effective. While this embraces the short term production objectives associated with agricultural development projects, what is fundamental to SARM projects is long term sustainability.
The participants to a workshop on project design (ASOCON 1991) deliberated on what constitutes a soil conservation project in the context of the needs and circumstances of small-scale farmers. Their covers the essence of what constitutes a SARM project, namely:
Other definitions are possible. But the above provides a useful characterisation of the essence of many SARM endeavours, regardless of the project scope or how its aims and objectives may have originally been stated.
A project may engage in a number of different types of activities (or project components) in order to attain its purposes and goals. Depending on the specific focus a SARM project may include one or more of the following broad activities or project components (after SADCC 1987a):
The above activities are listed as discrete project components, but in practice they are often interrelated. For instance, extension services within a project area may require strengthening before-field level extension activities can be implemented. Land user extension and training activities may be combined into an integrated project component.
Projects in rural areas are faced with different interest groups who do not necessarily share the same criteria for evaluating project success or failure (Skinner 1989). Firstl, there are the intended beneficiaries (local farm households) whom the project is trying, in the long- or short-term, to help. Their input is essential, and their priorities immediate, so they must be able to see immediate benefits. There will be indirect interest groups, that is people who are not the primary targets of the project but may be indirectly affected, beneficially or negatively, by its activities (e.g. local traders, sawmill owners, fishermen, downstream land users etc). Changes in land use as a result of project interventions may have a direct effect on the livelihoods of such groups. If adversely affected they may take political or direct action to hinder or stop project implementation.
Local government, and the local level offices of government line agencies, will have their own administrative, technical, social and political development objectives concerning their rural `clients'. National government will in addition have its own set of regional and sectoral development priorities. Finally, the executing agency and the donor(s) will have a set of criteria defining whether a project should be funded and what constitutes acceptable objectives and achievements. When each interest group comes to assess a project they can be expected to do so from significantly different perspectives.
For the World Bank, an economic rate of return (ERR) of up to 25% is the base for setting up projects. They are usually considered successful if they achieve more than 10 or 12% (Hudson 1991). In contrast small-scale farmers would usually require a marginal rate of return of 50-100% on any land use improvements before they would consider it worthwhile investing in change (CIMMYT 1988). The improvement must also occur within the time span of the farmer's planning, which usually means the next growing season, or at most 12 months. Donor agencies or recipient governments may appreciate the value of long-term benefits, or downstream benefits, or a 10% increase in average yield, but none of these are important to the small-scale farm household that has to take the decision on whether or not to implement the project recommendation (Hudson 1991).
Hudson (1991) in his FAO review of success and failure took as his yardstick the extent to which the project achieved its objectives. However this required that a project should have defined its objectives, and set up criteria for measuring them, which he found in practice to be rare.
Of concern in the context of measuring success in a sustainable agricultural programme is the issue of short-term production versus long-term sustainability. From a purely agricultural development perspective a project is deemed successful if in its life span (typically 3-5 years) it has raised yields by means of specific project interventions (e.g. use of improved seeds and fertiliser). However, short-term yield increases, due to an improvement in crop husbandry practices, may initially mask an overall long-term decline in the productive potential of the land due to inappropriate land use practices, i.e. the processes of land degradation may be continuing.
What needs to be known is whether project interventions have resulted in the adoption of improved field level practices that are both productive in the short-term and sustainable over the long term. In other words present production is not at the expense of future production, and present land use activities will not destroy a farm household's natural resource base nor deplete the capacity of the land to provide for the needs of present and future generations.
A SARM project would be judged successful if, during its life span, farmers adopt the recommended better land husbandry measures. However what it may not be possible to say over such a short period is whether or not the basic assumption underlying the project design - that the successful implementation of the projects recommended measures would reduce soil degradation - was in practice valid. In this regard a word of caution has to be injected to the assessment of a project as successful on the basis of comparing its achievements with its objectives and physical targets. Ultimately the success or failure will depend on the quality of the land resource long after the project is over. Few, if any, projects in the Asia Pacific region have been monitored and evaluated long enough, in terms of the bio-physical properties of the land resource, for us to conclude that agricultural production can be sustained with the available technologies. The assumption is they can but this has yet to be proved.
An FAO review of soil conservation projects found that faulty design was a major cause of poor project performance (Hudson 1991). A World Bank review of projects in the ten years to 1984 found that 86 percent of projects with poor performance had design faults and in one third of these it was the single most important factor (World Bank 1985).
On the basis of past project experience, we can formulate a set of questions that need to be considered during initial project design; if the answers to any are in the negative then the project is unlikely to succeed (after Hudson 1991):
Loose definition of project objectives is reported as a major failing in many projects. A common problem is that the immediate objectives are described too vaguely in the project document. There is also a frequent lack of linkage between the broad development objectives being addressed and the immediate objectives of a project (Hudson 1991). Without clear objectives it is difficult to measure their achievement by the project.
In project design a balance is required between aiming to meet national objectives and those of individual farm households, since these are not usually the same. The national objectives of governments may include things like increasing agricultural exports, or import substitution, which are of little interest to the small-scale farmer. The project design must therefore identify farm household goals and be firmly addressed to them. Many large agricultural development projects of the 1970s failed because this was not realised at the time (Hudson 1991).
An important issue that needs to be resolved in SARM is the potential conflict between short term development objectives, e.g. to increase food and cash crop production, and long-term natural resource management objectives e.g. maintenance of soil productivity, conservation of forests and water catchment protection. Production orientated objectives may be achievable during the life of a project, whereas many long term natural resource management objectives may not be realised in such a short period. Care therefore has to be taken in formulating short term (immediate) project objectives that they do not jeopardise the achievement of long term sustainability objectives.
Project design has to be based on limited attainable objectives. Reviews show that planners tend to be over optimistic about (Hudson 1991):
Certain types of development project will have easily definable outputs (wells, roads, hospitals, numbers of people vaccinated), hence evaluation of their success or failure is relatively straightforward involving noting actual output compared to the target. In relation to SARM it is difficult to establish meaningful targets against which project progress can be quantified. It is common to use a measurable item as a surrogate for the real target but this can introduce distortions. For example increase in crop yield has been used as a surrogate for measuring effectiveness of a soil conservation programme. But the programme will almost certainly include a package of practices, and a measured increase in yield claimed as the result of soil conservation practices may in fact be the result of improved water conservation, use of improved seed or fertiliser, or indeed factors external to the project such as improved marketing or pricing (Hudson 1991).
In many conservation projects, especially those with a physical planning approach to combatting land degradation, there will be visible and measurable outputs in terms of the length of diversion ditches constructed, numbers of check dams built, hectares of land terraced. Having physical targets for such measurable interventions, that have to be achieved within a specific time period, can lead to target chasing by project staff. If farmers will not voluntarily do the necessary construction work then the project may resort to either `bribing' the farmers (with financial incentives) to deliver, or using their own machinery or hired labourers to do the work, in order to show evidence of physical outputs in the time allowed for under the project plan. Few projects will measure whether such physical outputs have achieved any improvement in the bio-physical qualities of the land resource. The Upland Agriculture and Conservation Project in Java, Indonesia, is one of the few that makes any attempt to determine whether there has been any reduction in erosion, and again is one of the few to measure the quality of the work, rather than just the quantity of terraces constructed in farmers' fields (Gnagey 1991).
A major lesson to emerge from studies of development projects of all kinds, but particularly applicable to sustainable development of small-scale agriculture is the issue of flexibility. That is the willingness and ability of a project to alter its workplans in response to its experience and to people's priorities (Critchley 1991). To often in the past projects have failed because they have followed a blueprint style of operation where everything is worked out in detail in the project document, which then becomes enshrined as the operational rule book. This means that faults in the original project design continue even after they could, and should, have been corrected (Hudson 1991). Projects which involve the rigid setting of quantifiable goals are neither responsive to change nor sensitive to any form of learning process (Prior 1992).
The need is for flexibility to be written into the project at the design stage. In this way a project can respond to changing circumstances without appearing to fail. Workplans should always allow for reviews, and changes of direction. There should ideally be funds which are not tied to specific activities which can be used for items or activities which were overlooked during project preparation (Critchley 1991). In general NGOs and small projects are more flexible than large scale multi-million dollar area development projects. The former are better able to profit from their ability to adapt as the technicians and farmers learn from each other (Hudson 1991).
Donor and national government requirements for financial and operational accountability can make it hard for project management to make changes to project activities, when it may be felt necessary in the light of experience and changing field circumstances. This is particularly a problem if approval for a change in work plan and project direction has to be referred back to a project's desk officer in Brussels, Washington, New York, London or wherever the donor's administrative offices may be located. Flexibility must be viewed as a necessary virtue in programme execution. This means that governments and funding agencies must be prepared for major interim reviews during which programme content and budget are reexamined. Such adjustments should not always be deferred, or restricted to a formal mid-term review (IFAD 1992) and mechanisms should exist for more frequent reviews should the situation warrant it. It also clear that more responsibility has to be delegated to project managers for day to day decision making in respect to project implementation (Hudson 1991).
The development of conservation effective farming systems is a long term process as it involves farmers adapting and making incremental improvements to their existing land use practices. It is therefore clear that promoting sustainable agriculture through improvements in farmers land uses and management practices requires the support of long term programmes rather than short fixed-term projects (Hudson 1988, Critchley 1991, IFAD 1992, Prior 1992).
An FAO study (Hudson 1989) found that projects of short duration are not as effective as long-term projects and programmes. To quote
In the past, three-year projects were quite common, with World Bank having an average of four or five years, but every evaluation and assessment we have read points out what should have been recognised in the beginning, that agricultural systems change slowly, and a ten year horizon should be considered as the norm. The uptake of a new variety can be quick, but anything that affects the system or the social structure is slow. |
Conservation projects in particular rarely achieve much in just three to five years. Any agroforestry intervention or others involving the planting of perennial crops, even if established in the first year of a project's life, may still not have fully realised the promised benefits (productive or conservation) before the end of the project. Whereas soil conservation structures may be seen to visibly reduce runoff and trap sediment, short duration projects will not reveal whether overall soil productivity is being sustained given that it may take many years before the effects of soil nutrient decline will become obvious.
Development agency preoccupation with quantifiable, and therefore easily evaluated project goals has engendered the short term project approach. Incorporating into project design the less easily quantifiable project goals such as community involvement in the development process, and the longer term sustainability of project activities, requires a longer term project commitment (Prior 1992). The implications for this are that governments should develop long term planning profiles for conservation programmes and donors and/or Ministries of Finance offer long term financial support. This also requires that a political commitment be made by government to carry on supporting conservation activities as part of recurrent operations rather than solely as projects on the development budget (IFAD 1986and1992). This may be hard to achieve considering the severe financial constraints faced by some Asian and most Pacific countries.
There is a growing consensus that rather than isolated short-term projects a programme approach would be conducive to success in promoting SARM, although they are harder to implement from the point of view of governments and aid agencies (IFAD 1992, Prior 1992). The programme approach emphasises the need to start activities perceived by the local population as priorities, on a small scale and gradually expand them on the basis of experience gained during implementation. It implies constant adjustment to realities as perceived by the local population. It is not only a learning process. It is also open ended, in the sense that inputs and outputs for years four or five are not determined at the outset, or if they are, they can be substantially modified in the light of experience during implementation. Rather it is hoped that by responding to the felt needs of the target group and demonstrating the profitability of certain innovations, these will gradually gain momentum (IFAD 1992).
The programme approach lends itself to SARM programmes because (after Prior 1992): a) the primary (often non bio-physical) causes of land degradation must be identified and understood; b) there is a need to consult local communities and understand their needs and points of view; c) local social and cultural complexities need to be understood and where appropriate incorporated into programme design; d) indigenous conservation effective land management practices need to be identified and evaluated; e) improved technologies need to be identified and developed that will be technically viable and socially and economically acceptable; and f) government institutions or community (people's) organizations will need to be identified, and where necessary developed, that can continue with project initiated activities following withdrawal of the programme. All of these take time.
Making the programme approach operational is not easy. Where donor procedures do not permit the unequivocal promise of long-term support, it should still be possible for them to support a three-year or five-year time-slice of a longer national programme. This is considered better than the common practice of setting up projects with the `possibility', but no guarantee, of a second phase. Such uncertainty undermines the confidence both of the project and the cooperating farmers (Hudson 1991).
An IFAD study (1986) concluded that conservation projects should start small and build up as farmers, and project staff, gain experience and confidence with the recommendations, and are able to modify and adapt them in the light of their application at the field level. This statement holds true for SARM projects. In the initial stages a small investment ($100,000 or less) in a participatory technology/conservation farming systems development exercise may, in the long term, be more beneficial than large ($5 million plus) projects with only a 3-5 year life. Small scale projects have of financial necessity to avoid the payment of incentives to farmers. Instead they have to work with them to develop and disseminate acceptable extension recommendations that farmers can implement themselves within their available resources of land, labour and cash.
Large scale and short term projects are faced with the need to disburse funds within the limited time period available and to show evidence of physical outputs from this investment. It is therefore no wonder that they have so often resorted to the payment of incentives to farmers to meet a project's target of so many metres/kilometres of terraces or hedgerows at the farm field level. In addition because of the amount of money available the temptation is for a project to use earth moving machinery (graders, bulldozers) and hired labour for the construction of major conservation works such as check dams and gully plugs. Whereas the physical achievements by the end of many such largescale projects may be impressive, lack of commitment to the terraces and hedgerows by the farmers and lack of government funds for maintenance of the check dams and gully plugs, all too often means that within a few years there is little to show on the ground.
The literature contains many examples of so called pilot projects. The aim is often to test or develop a technology or methodology which could then be applied on a wider basis. This is true for the FAO/UNDP/UNIDO Farmer-centred Agricultural Resource Management Programme (FARM) which is supporting 13 small pilot projects in eight Asian countries.1
These pilot projects or FARM `field sites' are being used to develop participatory approaches for the "conservation, management and utilization of natural and agricultural resources in rainfed areas". However the experience of the FARM and similar programmes has revealed a number of limitations of using pilot projects, namely:
Box 47 i. to transfer modern methods of consultative land use planning including a strong element of Farming Systems Development methodology, to the Agro-Ecology Institute of Zhejiang Agricultural University, to combine these with traditional elements of Chinese agriculture, and to develop a set of procedures leading to successful rural development on a watershed basis; and ii. to establish in the Institute the capability to provide the necessary training in these procedures to officials of implementing agencies. The Agro-Ecological Institute (AEI) of the Zhejiang Agricultural University (ZAU) was expected to support the implementation of the World Bank Red Soil Rehabilitation Project Phase II (WBRS2P) in an informal technical advisory capacity. WBRS2P became operational in 1993 with the reported aim `to develop and apply methods of farming which are physically, economically, and socially sustainable'. Development planning is intended to be based on holistic treatment of watersheds as hydrological and social units of management. Two of the three watersheds selected for pilot studies under the TCP project were the same as those proposed for development under the WBRS2P, namely Fangxiadian in Jin Hua County and Huang Wa Ling in Anji County. The third watershed (Yan Wen Wu in Deqing County) was an AEI outreach site. All the watersheds targeted for development under WBRS2P had already been planned by local (county level) committees. During field visits in 1995 it became clear that none of these watershed plans had been developed using what the project document for TCP/CPR/4452 referred to as `modern methods of consultative land use planning including a strong element of Farming Systems Development Methodology'. On the basis of a visit to the Fangxiadian watershed it was noted that implementation of the physical plans was well under way. There was therefore little, if any, scope for the TCP project to change the existing WBRS2P approach to watershed planning, or to influence project implementation activities at the field level. Hence it was important for the TCP project to ask the question - what was it that the proposed pilot watershed planning studies were expected to achieve? This was because it was clear that any plans prepared as a result of the studies would not be implemented by the WBRS2P. Continuing with the studies in WBRS2P watersheds meant that the plans produced would be purely academic documents. Furthermore such plans could be expected to be strongly influenced by the approach, and reality, of the WBRS2P plans hence offered little in the way of an alternative planning approach. There could have been a role for the pilot studies, with their baseline data sets, in monitoring the environmental impact of the implementation of the WBRS2P plans. However this could have produced a conflict situation between AEI (with no official project monitoring mandate) and the WBRS2P, particularly should the monitoring show that implementation of the plan had had an adverse environmental impact. Douglas 1995 |
A change in approach from the conventional earthworks style of conservation project to those emphasising improved land husbandry has implications on project financing. It shifts the funding requirements from hardware(earthmoving equipment) and cash or food for work handouts, to a software approach where the emphasis is on disseminating ideas and skills which the project beneficiaries can take up on a voluntary basis. This results in a less costly approach. While this should in theory be welcomed, in practice it may mean projects fall below the funding levels that donors like to handle. For a donor the appraisal and supervision costs of a $500,000 project may be just as much as a project that costs $25 million. The way around this could be to combine several smaller projects under one umbrella programme.
The newer style project gives greater stress to items such as expanded technical assistance, mobilisation of land users, and pilot-scale interventions (with their implicitly higher risks of failure) - for which governments may be reluctant to borrow, even on a soft loan basis. This style of project may have to seek grant funding and/or NGO support until there have been enough success stories to prove the new approach is better than the old. It would currently appear that NGOs are more willing to fund truly participatory projects than the major donor agencies. Perhaps because the latter agencies have more to lose in finance, and their staff in prestige, if they go wrong.
The manner in which a project is executed and operated, and the specific agencies/departments which are to be responsible for its implementation will need to be carefully thought through. Special attention is required on the administrative context of the project area, including a consideration of the strengths and weaknesses of the agencies/departments concerned. Good project design requires clear agreement as to which institutional entity will do what (i.e. which components, activities, tasks they will be involved in) and the staffing, equipment supply and administrative measures required for them to perform effectively and efficiently. Provision should be made to ensure that control and co-ordination arrangements are adequate, including any improvements and/or amendments to existing institutions which may be necessary (Douglas and Lai 1988).
There is a need to provide for the effective management of a project as a whole, including the constitution of higher level committees to oversee project implementation, approve important expenditures, or formulate policy. In view of the importance of people's participation in the context of soil conservation, a means of involving representatives of farmers and other land users in the management process would be essential. Some of the most successful projects are those where the management board is controlled by the beneficiaries.
An issue which has received much attention is whether projects should be implemented through a special project management unit or through existing departments and agencies. There are arguments for and against (see box 48) but the general consensus is that they are best avoided unless the size and complexity of the project is such that it could not be handled by existing agencies.
Box 48 The arguments for a project management unit may include:
Possible disadvantages of a project management unit are:
(Hudson 1991) |
The generally low level of success in agricultural development projects, and soil conservation in particular, is caused to some extent by attempts to use unsuitable technologies (Hudson 1991). Projects need to offer a choice of practices that are easily adopted and offer tangible benefits. See chapter 12 section ... for a discussion on the design considerations for selecting technologies appropriate to the small-scale farming sector.
Studies have shown that small farmers rarely adopt complete technological packages, rather they tend to select from an array of introduced technologies and recommended practices those that they perceive as most appropriate to the natural and socio-economic conditions in which they operate (Sands 1986).
SARM projects should therefore aim to provide farmers with the basic principles (eg contour planting, use of hedge rows, rotations, ground cover, compost/green manures etc.), offer them a range of options appropriate to the local area (eg several alternatives rather than a single recommended practice), provide the necessary support services (nurseries, credit, technical advice etc) and let them choose and experiment and in so doing put together their own conservation-effective farming package based on their individual needs (Douglas 1992c).The traditional conservation approach has been to design a complete catchment layout of raised footpaths, diversion ditches, waterways etc and to combine this with a set of land management recommendations (determined according to the local land capability classification) into a complete package (i.e. conservation farm plan). Given that farmers interests and needs are different what they actually want is an `a la carte menu' rather than the set meal so as to choose for themselves according to their individual family requirements (Douglas 1993b). An alternative analogy is that of the buffet where everything is on display and farmers have the chance to see what is on offer before putting together their preferred selection, with the option of adding something extra later on.
Deficiencies in a recommended technology should not be discovered during a project. The proposed recommended practices should therefore be critically reviewed during project appraisal, and plans made to resolve any uncertainties by field trials, adaptive research, or a pilot project as appropriate. The following criteria can be used for such appraisal (Douglas and Lai 1988, Douglas 1992a):
In the past recommended soil and water conservation technologies have usually been judged according to the first and second of the above criteria. Whereas recommendations for increasing agricultural productivity have rarely considered more than the first four of the above. Its important to consider all the above in order to ensure that what is being recommended by a project really does benefit the farmers its intended for.
Likewise deficiencies in a recommended policy intervention should not be discovered during project implementation. Individual policy recommendations can be appraised according to the following criteria (Douglas 1992):
There has been growing awareness amongst development agencies as to the importance of monitoring and evaluation (M and E) both as a project management tool and as a means of assessing project achievements. As a result many development projects and programmes nowadays routinely include M and E as a standard feature. It is believed that many of the problems associated with the poor performance of past soil and water conservation projects could be corrected if those involved in their design and implementation included M and E as an integral project management component. However there is more to determining the performance of SARM projects than merely monitoring the implementation of project level activities. Of equal importance is to monitor the field level activities of the target farm households and to evaluate the effects of these on the productivity and sustainability of their land use enterprises (box 49). (For further discussion, see chapter 15.)
Because SARM projects often mean a long term development process, it is necessary to consider at the design stage how and whether activities initiated could be sustained after the initial funding phase. This requires ability as well as financial and manpower commitment on the part of the local government institutions involved, to be able to continue providing any technical and financial support that may be required to sustain project interventions.
Likewise if a community based people's organizations is set up to assist in implementing project interventions, will it have the means and motivation to continue without project support. Similarly the sustainability of recommended practices at the field (farmer) level needs to be established, particularly in relation to the farmer's capacity and willingness to continue adopting the recommended practices after project support has ended or reduced over time.
Box 49 Need for M and E Data In the context of sustainable agricultural development activities related to monitoring and evaluation (M and E) should encompass the collection and use of information on:
Priority should be given to incorporating these aspects into a projects overall M and E system design. Experience with soil conservation projects to-date also indicates the need to pay attention to organizational linkage issues and to understanding the inter-relationships and dependencies between different stakeholders and interest groups. Douglas 1994 |
The World Bank 10th Audit Report (quoted in Hudson 1991) discusses failures of post project sustainability in a study of 25 projects which were assessed as successful at completion. Thirteen of these were found to have failed between 5 and 15 years after the end of the project. Some reasons were:
Whereas many of the problems of poor project design and implementation lie within the government institutions responsible, any review of project experience within the Asia Pacific region inevitably leads to the conclusion that the donor agencies themselves are not without blame. The key donor limitations are as follows:
Project case studies can demonstrate how certain factors influence farm households' activities with regard to agriculture and conservation and can suggest which were instrumental in determining its success or failure. A key question that has then to be considered is to what extent can the success stories be reproduced4 elsewhere? Some project successes might be easily extended to areas with the same ecological, economic, cultural and religious setting.
However in considering whether particular success stories can be replicated, one should be aware that each project has a unique set of a) bio-physical conditions; b) social, cultural, political and economic characteristics; and c) community organizations and structures. As one collection of African case studies puts it, "it is impossible to use any of the case studies as a blueprint for success" (Commonwealth Secretariat 1992). This does not mean that the case study experience has nothing to offer another area; merely that it cannot be assumed that what worked in one place will automatically work in another.
Whereas it may not be possible to transfer specific technologies, policy interventions or community mobilisation methods there are many planning concepts and principles that can be learnt that will be applicable elsewhere. For instance cultures might differ from one place to another and even within similar ecological zones, but the need to work sensitively within cultures will remain a core element of success in development initiatives. There is one particularly important lesson for development experts from many case studies which is applicable to the whole of the Asia Pacific region. This is the recognition that farmers, whether literate or not, have a far greater capability than they have been given credit for to undertake their own data collection, analysis, development planning and project implementation (Chambers 1992, 1993aandb). Participatory rural appraisal and technology development would thus appear to offer promise for the development of future successful projects.
Attempts to replicate successful experiences should not seek to simply recreate identical activities in another place. Rather emphasis should be given to the lessons learned from processes and methods that have been shown to work. Knowledge of successful experiences is not enough, and cannot substitute for detailed knowledge and understanding of the farm households' local bio-physical and socio-economic conditions, and felt needs and problems within a project area. These are ultimately the key elements of success, and are integral to the successful replication of the relevant parts of the experience gained elsewhere (Commonwealth Secretariat 1992).
18 The FARM programme currently has pilot projects in China, India, Indonesia, Nepal, Philippines, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Vietnam.
19 One of the few examples from the Asia Pacific region of long term donor support is that of the Swiss Development Cooperation (SDC) funding of the sloping lands project of the IBSRAM ASIALAND network. SDC has currently supported 3 phases of this project (9 years) and is in the process of agreeing to support a further 3 year phase.
20 A good example of this was the withdrawal of UNDP financial support to the Asia Soil Conservation Network for the Humid Tropics (ASOCON) at the end of 1991, only to subsequently provide funds for the start up of very similar activities within the Farmer-centred Agricultural Resource Management programme (FARM) some 18 months later.
21The term commonly used for this is replication, although one author (Hudson 1992) regards this as incorrect usage and makes the point that a replica is an exact copy and trying to produce further exact copies of a successful project should not be encouraged as modifications will be needed to fit the unique circumstances of each project area.