A sustainable livelihoods approach for the
Africa-RISING ‘Quick Feed’ project in
Ethiopia
Peter Thorne
Africa-RISING Quick Feed Project Inception Workshop, Addis
1
Ababa, 7-8 May 2012

Hypotheses
 Households stratified by livelihood
endowments access and manage feed
resources in different ways.
 More robust development outcomes will
result from identifying practises that are
transferable amongst strata and
augmenting these with “external”
innovations that target constraints and
opportunities relevant to each stratum.
2

The proposed approach
Community feed
Household
management
livelihood Household feed
inventory
stratification management
characterisation
Wider adoption: constraints
to & opportunities for …
Innovation
Analysis
Identify complementary
technologies
Design follow-up
activities
3

Sustainable livelihoods
(SL) framework
4

5

Small-scale commercial poultry Resource poor household
6

The proposed approach
Community feed
Household
management
livelihood Household feed
inventory
stratification management
characterisation
Wider adoption: constraints
to & opportunities for …
Innovation
Analysis
Identify complementary
technologies
Design follow-up
activities
7

Household stratification
 By livelihood asset endowment
 Include vulnerability and risk
1. Community group discussions to identify
community-specific livelihood indicators.
2. Household interviews to assess individual
livelihood status against community
indicators.
3. Analyse to identify key strata, differentiated
on the basis of livelihood endowments
8

Why use SL for
stratification?
Don’t have to …
Endogenous (if you do it properly)
Rapid
– Identification of indicators (1 day)
– Household interviews (1 week)
Broad-based and open-ended
Can feed into feasible M & E
9

The proposed approach
Community feed
Household
management
livelihood Household feed
inventory
stratification management
characterisation
Wider adoption: constraints
to & opportunities for …
Innovation
Analysis
Identify complementary
technologies
Design follow-up
activities
10

Community feed
resources
 Develop a picture, across the community,
of:
– the range of available resources
– access limitations and other constraints
 Use existing tools – FEAST, informal
household survey?
 Independent of household stratification
and conducted subsequently.
11

The proposed approach
Community feed
Household
management
livelihood Household feed
inventory
stratification management
characterisation
Wider adoption: constraints
to & opportunities for …
Innovation
Analysis
Identify complementary
technologies
Design follow-up
activities
12

Household
characterisation
Select representative households in
each stratum.
Identify feed access issues / feed
management practices that are
representative of each stratum.
Household interviews – based around
tools such as FEAST / Techfit?
13

The proposed approach
Community feed
Household
management
livelihood Household feed
inventory
stratification management
characterisation
Wider adoption: constraints
to & opportunities for …
Innovation
Analysis
Identify complementary
technologies
Design follow-up
activities
14

Innovation
 Increasing access across strata
 Transferability of practices amongst strata
 Capitalising on existing opportunities
 Reducing risk and vulnerability associated
with existing practises
 Identifying “external” technologies that
genuinely strengthen existing practises.
 Strong participation can make this the first
step in implementation
15

Discussion points
 Do we adopt this proposed approach?
 If so, how do we improve it?
 Who will do it?
 When?
 How many households for each stage of
the analysis?
 How can we extend the livelihoods
analysis to include vulnerability and risk?
16