1. Livelihood Development and Social Inclusion
of Most Marginalized Communities in
Mainstream Development:
Hands on experience in Koggala
Chopadithya Edirisinghe, Practical Action,
P.M. Senarantha, Creative Action
&
Asitha Wewaldeniya, Development with Disabled Network
Paper presented at the International Workshop on
Enterprise services to meet the needs
of the most vulnerable and disadvantaged people
SEEDS (Gte) Ltd
16 to 18 May 2010
Colombo
Sri Lanka

2. Livelihood Development and Social Inclusion of Most Marginalized Communities
in Mainstream Development: Hands on experience in Koggala.
Chopadithya Edirisinghe, Practical Action, P.M. Senarantha, Creative Action & Asitha.
Wewaldeniya, Development with Disabled Network
Abstract
Social marginalization is a common issue in development. Physically handicapped
people, elderly people, mentally ill people, widows, etc., are the main categories who
have been marginalized in the process of development. As their voices are not strong
enough to receive the attention of others, hardly anyone seems to notice them. Due to
this discrimination, they have been invisible in society and such groups have been put
away from development benefits.
The livelihood project of Practical Action with Creative Action and Development with
Disabled Network have jointly initiated a programme to test the idea of inclusion of most
marginalized categories into the mainstream development process with 300 families
living in Koggala area. The project staff had a few rounds of discussions with
government officials to create awareness about the intended intervention. Their support
was obtained to organize village level sensitization workshops. Families were selected
based on the findings of sensitization programmes conducted within 14 villages in the
Koggala Divisional Secretariat division. These sensitization programmes had two
objectives. The first was to create awareness on marginalization of communities and the
second was to identify the most marginalized people for the development process.
Selecting volunteer groups was the next step. Volunteers were from among the same
community members who showed interest in working for most marginalized people.
There were volunteers from among the most marginalized categories as well. These
volunteers had been trained to deal with their issues. Capacity development
programmes for most marginalized people on life skills and livelihood skills were
conducted throughout the project period of one year. As a result, nearly 126 people
initiated self employment activities in the area. It has developed networks among these
marginalized groups through the formation of self help groups (SHGs). These SHGs
have been empowered to make their voices heard and gain access to services from
outside. Savings were encouraged through SHGs and over Rs.100,000 savings have
been observed within the groups. The other stakeholders including both state and non-
state actors, were organized at divisional secretariat level and linked with entire layers.
The idea of this whole exercise was to develop recognition for the most marginalized
people within the family, within the neighbourhood and thereby within the society
through strengthening their economic livelihoods.
1.0 Introduction
Rebuilding livelihoods of marginalized communities is a challenge for any development
agency where the inclusion of most needy people in to the development process is still
an unsolved issue. The Markets and Livelihood Development programme of Practical

3. Action South Asia has conducted various livelihood development programmes specially
with tsunami affected communities, decided to initiate a special programme to find out
key factors that help or hinder inclusion of most marginalized communities in the
development process. This activity was conducted in Koggala1
which is one of the
project sites of Practical Action, under the BLF2
project. This area was affected by
tsunami devastation on 26 December 2004 and it was recoded that over 280 people lost
their lives and more than 85 people were injured (RADA, 2006). Even before the
tsunami this area was affected by a slow set disaster which was identified as salting the
fresh water lagoon of Koggala due to excessive removal of sand in the lagoon mouth
and construction of breakwaters (Practical Action, 2007). As a result of both
devastations the livelihoods of those communities were severely disturbed, the paddy
lands get abandoned and fishers could not get their normal catch. These had been
considered the main livelihoods of poor communities living in the area. As this area was
selected by Practical Action to intervene in the post tsunami rebuilding process, the
Markets and Livelihood Development programme of Practical Action initiated different
livelihood development activities to serve those marginalized communities to overcome
the situation. However, the project team has experienced limited participation of most
marginalized categories among the poorer groups, specially groups like mentally and
physically handicapped people, elderly people and women heading households, etc.
These groups seemed to be hidden and never came out. The project, therefore, decided
to put an extra effort to identify a strategic way to reach most marginalized categories in
a given society and find a way to develop their livelihoods in a sustainable manner while
including them in the mainstream development process.
2.0 Objectives of the interventions
This is basically an action research conducted by Practical Action with the main
objective of developing a strategy to include most marginalized people in mainstream
development. The specific objectives were as follows:
- Develop livelihoods of 300 most marginalized people living in Koggala area
- Create a network of organizations working for most marginalized people living in
Koggala area.
- Inclusion of most marginalized people into the mainstream development
programme in Koggala DS division.
1
Koggala is situated in Southern Province of Sri Lanka, 10 km south of the main city of the province,
Galle.
2
Big Lottery Fund ,UK

4. 3.0 Clients and partners
The programme had embraced 592 marginalized people (MPs) around the koggala
lagoon in all its activities in 14 selected villages as at beginning of the project. The
project was targeted for people who are suffering mental health problems, people with
disabilities, senior citizens and women headed families. There were 110 having mental
illnesses or mental health problems, 187 senior citizens, 161 women headed families
and 134 disabled people among them.
As a leading development organization in Sri Lanka, Practical Action has several years
of experience working with most marginalized groups such as disabled people and
women headed households under its project in working with marginalized communities.
Even though the project has come to an end the acquired knowledge is now with the
‘Development with Disabled Network’ of Sri Lanka, the successor to the project.
Therefore, Practical Action decided to get the Network’s expertise on this special
mission. Similarly the Creative Action, a newly created institution by a group of
volunteers who had been working with Basic Needs3
in its pilot project on Community
Mental Health and Development in the Southern Province, having vast experience on
working with mentally ill people, was selected as implementation partner for this project.
The activity was planned using human resources of above institutions under the
conceptual direction of DRSL4
framework introduced by Practical Action.
4.0 Enterprise service interventions and strategies
The project team initiated its implementation work through creating awareness about the
activity among the different levels of stakeholders in this process. The first step was
conducting initial discussions with government officers in the area to introduce
themselves and the programme which was done on a one to one basis. The project
identified various officers that are responsible for the development of target beneficiaries
of this programme within the region and got their blessing through those individual
meetings. It was found to be one of the crucial success factors of this type of
programmes where one could avoid various misunderstandings that could occur later.
The field officers then started to visit village leaders both formal and informal and initiate
discussions with them on the necessity of having such a programme in their village and
tried to collect information on four types of most marginalized people such as women
3
BasicNeed is a UK based INGO working on community mental health and development.
4
Disaster Resistant Sustainable Livelihood Development framework was the policy framework introduced
to livelihood centred approach to disaster management by Practical Action.

5. headed households, disabled people, mentally ill people and elderly people in these
villages. Based on the information received from the village leaders the programme
planned and initiated village level awareness creation meetings to introduce the concept
to villagers through Community Consultation Workshops. The Grama Sewaka (GS)5
was invited to participate in the meeting to increase the trust of the community in the
programme. It had also discussed the basic issues within the village including facts
about most marginalized communities. Those programmes were used to organize
people on small groups and organizing volunteers. The lesson captured here was that
majority of marginalized people were living under the custody of their own family with the
belief they are only a shame to the family. However, this could be solved with correct
sensitization methods and it would be possible to change the mind set of family
members to allow these marginalized people to mix with society.
The project team developed a group of volunteers who are able to provide assistance to
the beneficiaries which was the key factor in this programme. Volunteers were selected
through Community Consultation Workshops from the community as well as from the
above four categories of most marginalized people. The capacities of volunteers were
developed using the expertise from Practical Action, Disability Network, Creative Action
and other organizations.
Using the network of volunteers as well as field animators, self help groups (SHGs) were
organized within the community. Marginalized people in the community were included in
SHGs together with others. One or two (maximum) volunteers also were within these
SHGs and they had regular fortnightly meetings. The animators were expected to
participate at SHG meetings in initial stages to increase their morale during the process.
Meetings were used to provide knowledge on various subjects such as home
expenditure management, increase of savings, etc. Meeting places were the contact
places between the beneficiary and the project.
This activity was done within a period of one year from July 2008 to June 2009, under
the strict supervision of the livelihood development project. The project conducted
monthly monitoring meetings, field supervision visits, and close contact with all staff
involved in activities. Monthly monitoring meetings were not meant only to monitor the
monthly progress but also to guide the study team to reach the objectives of
demonstrating the applicability of Disaster Resistant Sustainable Livelihood
Development (DRSL) approach with the most marginalized categories living in
vulnerable conditions.
5.0 Impact - Changes in the lives of clients served
5
Grama Sewaka is the government officer responsible for village administrative matters.

6. Out of 300 targeted families 91 have started new income generation activities and 126
families received services to develop their existing income generation activities. They
practise income and expenditure recording and initially it was recorded that 93 families
had saved up to Rs.26,918 and after 3 months it had increased up to Rs.36, 284 by 96
families. It was evident that they were developing the habit of saving their income.
Majority of the stabilized people have returned to their previous occupations, thus
reducing the economic burden on the family as well as increasing the economic status
due to release of the carer for productive work. Home gardening activities introduced
after expenditure analysis programme, was contributing tremendously to the daily meals
of the families who are engaged in the pilot work and there is an interest shown by
others as well. The project has also provided business management (primary level)
aspects to those who have been involved in the programme.
As a result of networking with other service providers working in Habaraduwa area and
as per identified target category needs, several agreed interventions such as providing
health services other than mental health, speech therapy, eye clinics, services for the
disabled at special clinics, low-interest loan scheme for affected people, business
proposal preparation and induction programme on business planning for those wishing
to start enterprises, agricultural programme and environmental protection activities were
conducted.
The project had facilitated the holding of a fair and beneficiaries bring their products to
the fair for sale. This gives them an opportunity to move with others and build their
confidence. They are also able to earn money and manage day to day expenses.
Volunteers for the project came up on their own so that a volunteer base could be
developed in their own villages. It was observed that the programme’s vision has been
transferred well to the community level through a range of capacity building
programmes. Participants considered such programmes as socializing events, in
addition to the knowledge they gained through them. Project has provided technical
training as well as mobilisation and leadership training to the volunteers for supporting
support to marginalised groups. Trained volunteers were capable of dealing with more
than 500 most marginalized people of the community.
Close partnerships were built with local government officers in the facilitation of their
service delivery mechanisms with the Divisional Secretariat Office. Government and
non-government organizations participated at meetings organized on psychosocial

7. interventions. Initial discussions with service providers on working with marginalized
communities in Habaraduwa area resulted in service-exchange collaboration with
organizations such as Leonard Cheshire Disability Resource Centre, Southern Disability
Centre and Habaraduwa Participatory Development Foundation.
There was unprecedented participation at a divisional level network meeting held with all
government and NGO sector representatives. Participants included several eminent
personalities, representatives from all levels of government staff, other administrative
officers, staff of various government departments in the health sector, chairpersons,
directors and other representatives of I/NGOs, CBOs, community volunteers,
representatives of our 4 target categories. The workshop was collaboratively organized
by Practical Action and Disability Network and Creative Action. At the workshop these
target groups presented their own problems to audience together with their suggestions.
This really helped to change people’s negative attitudes.
There is evidence to show that marginalized people’s family bonds and recognition have
improved as a result of changes in their health status, behaviour and acceptance by the
community. It was clearly proven that immediate interventions along with strong
community/family support and care could reduce frequency of relapses as it was
reportedly evident that the external environment contributes to triggering off factors in
many cases.
6.0 Challenges and Issues
The main challenge faced by the project team was dealing with the dependency
mentality of project beneficiaries. Not only the target beneficiaries but also the family
members of the beneficiaries and officers of the area expected physical donations for
the project beneficiaries rather than empowering them to stand on their own feet. It took
a long time to change this mentality.
Marginalization of voiceless people within any social class is a common issue as also
observed by the project. Willingly or unwillingly people tend to do so. However, in a post
disaster rehabilitation situation this became even worse because everyone was in a
competitive mode to acquire limited resources for themselves.
Inclusion of most marginalized people into the mainstream development process is an
essential element of livelihood development. From the practitioners’ point of view
livelihood development and social inclusion of most marginalized communities are not
two different topics that need to be addressed separately. It is necessary to address the

8. issue of inclusion of most marginalized communities in any attempt of livelihood
development. However, the key lesson here is, unless one is aware about the necessity
of giving special attention to reach the most marginalized people, creating awareness
among all stakeholders in the area about them and sensitizing these stakeholders about
the special requirements of the most marginalized categories, organizing marginalized
people with the community they are living with, develop their capacities through specially
focused programmes, and last but not least networking them with other development
partners, inclusion is not practical in development initiatives.