Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA) is a methodology that involves local communities in the collection and analysis of data regarding their circumstances, needs, and potential. PRA emphasizes participation, flexibility, teamwork, and diversity, employing various techniques such as social mapping and wealth ranking to facilitate understanding and planning for community development. The approach aims to empower communities by recognizing their knowledge and experiences, making them central to the decision-making process.

2. INTRODUCTION to pra
WHAT IS PARTICIPATORY RURAL APPRAISAL?
• Appraisal –The finding out of information about problems,
needs, and potential in a village. It is the first stage in any
project.
• Participatory – Means that people are involved in the process
in deciding how something is done.
• Rural – The techniques can be used in any situation, urban or
rural, with both literate and illiterate people.

3. PARTICIPATORY RURAL APPRAISAL (PRA)
PRA - Methods of data
collection.
But makes the DIFFERENCE?
• Participatory in nature.
• Community people are the
Master.
• Expert knowledge not required.
• You are only a Facilitator/
Mobiliser
In other word, Participatory
rural appraisal (PRA) is a family
of approaches and methods to
enable rural people to share,
enhance & analyze their
knowledge of life & conditions, to
plan & to act.
Also known as Participatory
Learning and Action (PLA)

4. CHALLENGES
 Expect the unexpected (rodents, mosquitoes, street
hawking, open markets)
 Expect poor road conditions
 No electricity or power failures (your computer loses
power…)
 Lots of people may follow you around (no
confidentiality!)
 Time feels different
So how are you going to get your work done?

5. KEY PRINCIPLES
 Participation – local people serve as partners in data collection
and analysis
 Flexibility- not a standardized methodology
 Teamwork – everyone is involved
 Diversity – attempts made to identify and analyse contradictions
and exceptions
 Optimal Ignorance – leave out unessential details
 Systematic – to get correct details and conclusions, it is best to
cross check
 Reversal of Learning – Learning from rural people directly
on the site and face to face.

6. pra techniques
 Physical mapping
 Do-it-yourself
 Venn-Diagram
 Time trend
 Matrix ranking
 Impact diagrams
 Semi – structured interviews
 Mapping-community members depicting the physical or social characteristics of their
community.
 Social Mapping
 Wealth Ranking

7. social mapping
 Social mapping is a PRA method that involves the
sketching/drawing of houses and other social facilities
and infrastructure (i.e. temple, stores, rice mills,
school, pharmacy, trails and roads, water pumps,
irrigation and recreation facilities) in a village.
 It helps to visualize and situate the location of
households and other social facilities/infrastructure in
a village.
 It serves as a baseline for planning, implementation,
monitoring, and evaluation of village development
activities (including selection of village organizing
strategy).

8. social map-by rural people

9. objectives
 To learn about the social structures in the village and
the differences among the households by ethnicity,
religion and wealth.
 To learn about who is living where.
 To learn about the social institutions and the different
views local people might have regarding those
institutions.

10. VILLAGERS & PANCHAYAT MEMBER WORKING AT SOCIAL MAPPING TOOL
IN PRA TRIANING IN SUNDerBAN VILLAGE

11. wealth ranking
This tool is a method for collecting and
analyzing data on perceptions of wealth
differences and inequalities in a community
and for identifying and understanding local
indicators and criteria of wealth, well-being,
and poverty.

12. OBJECTIVE
understanding socioeconomic differences within communities
 understanding local perceptions of and criteria for wealth, well-
being, and inequality in a community
 categorizing households or social groups into different locally
perceived economic or more general well-being categories
exploring differences in how different people have access to and use
resources
 identifying target group members before a project, program, or
policy is changed or implemented, or to determine the extent to which
targeting has proved successful after the event

13. card sorting method:

14. Wealth ranking

15. BEFORE CLOSING…….
PRA
SHARING
METHODS
ATTITUDE
&
BEHAVIOUR

16. references
 En.m.wikipedia.org/……/participatory_rural……..
 www.fao.org/docrep/003/....../x5996eo
 Web.worldbank.org/…../o,,contentmdk:…..
 Siteresources.worldbank.org/…./3_so…..
 www.ifmrlead.org/..../2.-pra-technique-.....
 Cec.vcn.bc.ca/cmp/modules/par-tech
 www.slideshare.net/iccnn/paticipatory-rural-appraisal-
kala-rai?related=1