In this important transition moment for Kosovo — after nine years of undetermined status — the view from communities offers critical lessons for structuring effective policy and aid for continued stability and recovery.

Responding to an open-ended inquiry regarding the most significant changes in terms of stability and recovery since the active conflict in the late 1990s, Kosovans from 13 diverse communities identified the issues, actors and approaches that have had the greatest impact on these changes. With projected financial needs for Kosovo estimated at €1.25 billion for 2008-2010, local and international actors should heed Kosovan’s own measures of effectiveness.

The key findings of this report indicate that

• Stability and recovery is not primarily “politics”
• Stability and recovery is locally driven and owned
• Gaps exist between local priorities and policy initiatives
• Community leadership narrows the gaps
• Continued recovery requires a cross-sectoral, integrated approach

Since beginning work in Kosovo in 1993, Mercy Corps Kosovo’s focus has shifted from relief to recovery, to long-term development. Over a 15 year period, Mercy Corps Kosovo has implemented over 30 programs worth in excess of US$50 million and currently operates from a Head Office in Prishtinë / Priština, covering 27 Municipalities.

This research is part of The LEAPP Project (Learning for Effective Aid Practice and Policy), a two-year, multi-country study initiated by Mercy Corps to understand the impact of community-led programming in conflict and post-conflict transitional environments. Pilot research was conducted in Kosovo from May-June 2008.

Access “What Matters In Kosovo” here.

For anyone interested in understanding the differences between qualitative and quantitative research methods this website hosted by the Web Center for Social Research Methods. All too often we get into fruitless debates about which approach is better, whereas both are equally valid approaches and more important is to determine which approach is better for the research you are looking at conducting. The bite size chunks and easy navigation make this is a useful site to peruse and then bookmark. Highly recommended!

This ODI opinion paper here provides a fairly harsh critique of development agencies’ attempts to foster community-based tourism. The main criticism is that these projects usually fail because they have not been set up sustainably and the article points to some interesting facts and figures (e.g. a recent survey across the Americas show that many of the CBT accommodation providers have only 5% occupancy). The counter solution proposed in the piece is that we should in fact be doing more to include the poor in mainstream tourism and there are more opportunities than have previously been perceived. In one project in Brazil a large mainstream resort increased its employment of local people by 40% in a year following training and an extra $2 million is now flowing into the local economy. I’m not sure I agree full-heartedly with the solutions proposed and think the critique may be a little harsh, but it definitely provides food for thought.

The Canadian Catholic Organization for Development and Peace (a member of Caritas) has just published a new report on the effects of the global food system on smallholders, communities and farmers in the global south. The 22-page report, prepared with input and reflections from Development and Peace partners in the countries where it works in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East, provides a Christian reflection on food and hunger, highlighting catholic social teaching on the issue. The report calls for a serious overhaul of the system that has led to the current global food crisis.

You can download the English version here, and read the synopsis here.

“Our increasingly fragile global food system is in major trouble. Decades of inappropriate economic and agricultural policies have finally become too much for farmers and people around the world to withstand. Decision-making power over one of the most primary elements of life – food – has been wrenched from the people who produce and need food, and placed in the hands of people who profit from its trade. The policies of the international financial institutions, and the World Trade Organization (WTO), shaped by the governments of the North, have systematically undermined the capacity of individuals and communities to access food, and the resources to grow their own.“

“This report explores the long-term causes of the global food emergency, as well as the specific current day factors that are converging to increase global hunger. It is based on the experience of Development and Peace’s partners in Africa, Asia, Latin America and the Middle East.  As Milo Tanchuling, of the Freedom from Debt Coalition in the Philippines notes, ‘[t]oday’s problems come from yesterday’s solutions’”.

“It is imperative to bring agriculture back to its primary and basic function: to nourish local and national communities.“
- The Assembly of Quebec Catholic Bishops  May 1, 2008

The Masie Center’s Learning Consortium has just posted a report on a survey of over 6000 employees on how they learn and preferred methods. A summary is posted here and the full article which has interesting graphs in it is also available to download from the site. The survey discovered that most employees currently rely primarily on self learning and motivation and pick up new knowledge from reading, web searches and/or e-learning on line. A lot of people are using sources such as YouTube but are not necessarily using podcasts as they aren’t easily accessible from work. Only 48% of people are satisifed with the amount of time they have available to learn and I would be interested to know how this maps against our own organizations. We have invested time in creating placeholders for learning, but whether people are taking the opportunity to make this happen (or prioritizing over all the competing things we are asked to do) would be something to explore. Perhaps most interestingly for me, people seem to overwhelmingly want to have job stretch/rotation opportunities and yet don’t feel that these opportunities exist. I wonder if this would be the same finding if we just looked at the humanitarian world, where it seems as though there are numerous opportunities (maybe too many) to rotate through different jobs fairly rapidly. I also wonder if these are much more accessible to international than to national staff. Anyway the article gave me food for thought and is worth looking at.

A Business Week article from a few years ago recently resurfaced in a discussion humanitarian planning, and it made me think about why we still have the concepts of ‘headquarters’ and ‘field’ offices long after leading transnational companies have abandonned these in favor of truly distributed leadership with executive level folks spread out around the world to leverage proximity to clients, lower costs, talent availability and time zone responsiveness.

Take a look at the article here, and let me know what you think - why don’t NGOs have more of their senior leadership in the countries where they work?

Alejandro Bendaña (Harvard Ph.D. and founder of the Centro de Estudios Internacionales in Managua, Nicaragua) writes a provocative piece for FocusWeb (Focus on the Global South) (www.FocusWeb.org) called Alternative Financing for Development. It is short, readable, and challenges our usual assumptions about what ‘development’ is.

His thesis that ‘“Development aid” as practiced by the North is part of a system that generates deepening inequality and dependence across and within countries. In this context, it is a question of making aid less not more effective, of ending aid altogether, because on the whole it does more harm that good.‘ is not unusual in itself, but his concrete ideas for alternatives are interesting.

This 6-page report by McKinsey has some excellent examples of how some large non-profits have got round the challenges of how to measure progress towards fulfilling their mission. You do have to sign up to read the full article, but it only takes a couple of seconds and is well worth it. The article takes the Nature Conservancy as an example of an agency that had two macro-level indicators (revenue generated and increased number of protected habitats) until they realised that neither of these indicators were telling them whether they were making progress towards the real heart of their mission which was increasing biodiversity. The authors claim there are three critical performance metrics needed by an organization:- success in raising resources, staff effectiveness and progress toward its mission fulfillment, with the last being the hardest to measure. They outline three ways of mission measurement: 1) through narrow definitions of success, through research, or through proxy indicators. They draw examples from several organizations which is useful and thought provoking.

As a techno-phobe who still doesn’t own her own cell phone (in part because of a traumatic experience in post-tsunami Sri Lanka where I had two mobiles which rang simultaneously every half hour, literally through the night!), I am fascinated by examples of how technology is improving (or hindering) development in poorer nations. This link to a BBC news article gives some really good concrete examples of how Reuters news, through a service called Market Light is being disseminated via text messages to farmers in India and enabling them to make real time decisions on how to improve their crops and get better services for them.

Amnesty International has just published a succinct report that lists death sentences and executions globally in 2007. Of all the executions that took place, 88% occurred in just 5 countries: China, Iran, Saudi Arabia, Pakistan and the USA. The two tables on pages 6 and 7 reveal some surprises in which countries have the highest figures. The report draws attention to various UN resolutions that call for transparency publishing numbers relating to these types of death sentences and notes how hard it is in many countries to get reliable data. The report is also available in Spanish, Arabic and French.

The 2008 report by Amnesty on the State of the World’s Human Rights is also out and searchable by country. This year marks 60 years since the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. The report shows that, “sixty years after the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was adopted by the United Nations, people are still tortured or ill-treated in at least 81 countries, face unfair trials in at least 54 countries and are not allowed to speak freely in at least 77 countries.”