- by Abid Ullah Jan
A unique model of information system for local development, presently being implemented by UNICEF in Pakistan.
Implementing CIS Programme in an area is comprised of different phases with districts steps. The three main phases are:
- Data Collection Phase;
- Planning and monitoring Phase and
- Integration phase.
1. CIS - Data Collection Phase
This phase has the following distinct main steps beginning with formation of Village Action committee and ending with data consolidation.
1.1 Contact
Objective: To put a grassroots set up in place for carrying out CIS activities
Out come: Village Action Committee (VAC) in place in each village for sustaining the CIS programme
Responsibility: SOs of the implementing organisation
The first thing the Social Organisers of the implementing organizations need to visit the target Union Council, meet UC Nazim, Naib Nazim, Secretary Union Council and other elders of the area.
The SO also has to ensure that he meets Chairman and other members of CCB if it exists in the area. If CCB has not been formed as yet, the SO can form a Village Action Committee.
In these preliminary meetings the field staff need to explain CIS, its objectives and benefits to the concerned stakeholders at the UC and village levels in detail.
Elders’ meeting in every village plays a vital role in facilitating launching and success of the CIS. In such meetings SOs need to highlight importance of information by giving relevant to the situation examples. They need to be told that information plays a vital role in:
- Development planning;
- Assessment of the situation;
- Identification of problems
- Prioritisation and setting objectives,
- developing actions plans and
- Optimal use of the available resources
This is the time for form a Village Action Committee (VAC) if CCB is not present or if a VAC is inevitable despite CCB’s presence formation. After facilitating VAC in forming its own terms of reference, it would help the field workers identify community activists from each village and Mohalla, where needed.
Basic criteria for activists selection is the persons who:
- know how to read and write,
- can spare time and volunteer to collect information from household to household in the community, and
- who are trusted by the community – with whom community would not hesitate to share household level information.
A meeting place is selected for VAC to regularly meet (at least on monthly basis), share and update information, and plan for development. Village Profile Board would be displayed at the same location for information of all. The SOs need to attend one or two meetings of the VAC.
Formation of VAC (where CCB does not exit) is the initial but extremely crucial stage of the implementation process. Social organisers need to be patient as conceptual clarity at the community level and preparation of ground might be a bit time consuming. Rushing would turn the process into a one-time information collection activity and improper mobilisation might create some problems at later stages, such as resistance posed by members of a Tablighi jammat in Mardan, who were not aware about the programme.
Try to create a link between information and project; information and the scheme they are expecting; information and the assessment, analysis and action process, and show that nothing is possible without information. Once they are convinced about importance of information, the field workers need to pose the question: ask them who will do it? This will automatically facilitate them towards the answer that they themselves would have to collect and update information for their development. This is the right time for forming VAC. The more the VAC is comprised of representative volunteers, the more it would be effective.
Identifying the right activists individually and with the assistance of VAC is also important part of the SOs pre-programme launching activities. Experience shows that activists identified by SOs in a meeting have been more effective than the activists nominated by others for the simple reason that they may not know about their expected tasks and they may find the work too difficult to undertake.
Criteria for Village Action Committee at Village Level
Membership:
As mentioned earlier, VAC shall be formed if there is no CCB working in the village. Apart from other volunteers, SOs should give preference to including the following five members in the VAC:
1. three activists (educational qualification at least High school graduates and possessing positive attitude towards development);
2. one Union Council member, preferably General Councillor; and
3. one elderly man having high social acceptance at village level.
Membership may vary according to specific situation at different villages. In real sense VAC of just five persons is not representative of acceptable at all. The above mentioned persons are recommended for increasing effectiveness of the committee.
In populated villages, one VAC might not be adequate. Still, if we had to go for just one VAC, we either have to increase membership or the best alternative is to give maximum representation to every group of the population.
Duration:
Four years (term should be in line with duration of district government). There, however, can be no hard and fast rule fo the duration of VAC. However, there must be a mechanism for inflow of activists, because active members might move out of the village or they may get involved in some kind of time consuming job.
Responsibilities of VAC:
Member of the VAC would:
- identify activists for data collection;
- assist activists in collection of data and prepare ground for information sharing in the village;
- assist activists in consolidation of data through the use of tally sheets
- local verification of data;
- get involved in preparation of VDP;
- fund raising for implementing VDP;
- propose and initiate solution of local problems under self help;
- do record keeping for updating village level information;
- represent village at UC level;
- keeping an eye on overall village development;
- make presentation to visitors;
- delegate responsibilities to various members;
- assist in preparation and updating of VPB;
- develop village map; and
- monitor and review VDP.
Training of VAC members is needed for effective performance. Tenure of the VAC must not be a problem because most of the members belong to the community and as long as the community trust them, they may perform their responsibility. The implementing organisation, however, has to link them to various departments and development agencies so that it is easy for them to materialise their development plans. In particular, VAC members have to closely work with UN Secretary and Nazim.
For effective institutionalisation, it is imperative that the implementing organisation either start working with CCB or make VAC part of CCB, or gradually turn VAC into CCB for making it a part of the Local Government set up. This recognition is necessary for their acceptance and earning cooperation.
Responsibility of SOs:
SOs of the implementing organisation will:
- Mobilize community to form VAC Committee;
- Identify and train activists;
- hold monthly meetings at village level;
- Keep close contact with elected local representatives and Secretary UC;
- Prepare monthly work plan and progress report and submit it to the implementing organisation;
- Facilitate Village and UC level planning and relevant activities;
- Follow up with activists, councillors and CCB members, etc.
Responsibilities of community Activists:
Community activists are expected to:
- hold informal community meetings for establishing Community Information system in the village;
- assist SO in holding mass meetings;
- collect Village data;
- get involved in consolidation of data on tally sheets;
- prepare VPB;
- prepare village map;
- do record keeping for updating village level information;
- act as a key player in village level planning
- keep alive the overall CIS programme at community level; and
- assist SO in organizing village meetings.
Role of Village Elders:
- create awareness and remove misconceptions about community information system in the village;
- assist activist/SO in dealing with local revenue personnel for data collection;
- lead in fund raising for solution of village problems and new development issues;
- monitor CIS system in the village; and
- look after activities planned under self-help
Role of elected Councillor:
- Assist in preparation of ground for establishing community information system in the village;
- assist activist in dealing with local revenue/district government personnel for data collection;
- get involved in preparation of VDP;
- represent village at UC level; and
- be a voice of village at all levels.
1.2 Activists Training
Objectives: To enable the community activists for collection of data from each household and developing village level physical and social maps. Also enable them to fill tally sheets for grassroots consolidation of village level information and do the required monitoring.
Outcome: A substantial number of activists trained in each village for data collection, consolidation and later on village level planning and regularly updating the data
Responsibility: HRD Officer and Social Organisers of the implementing organisation
Orientation of community activists is an important step before assigning them the responsibility of data collection. See detail agenda for activist orientation workshop as Annex- 2. Activists are informed about the need and rationale behind CIS and the role they are expected to play in the whole process. They are taken through each question of household questionnaire so that they understand the concept and logic behind each question. It helps them avoid common mistakes that occur while filling household questionnaire without understanding the background. A detail about each question in the household questionnaire is annexed as Annex – 3 for use in activists training. Trainers may use it for their own understandings and also its Urdu translation as handouts for community activists.
Staff of the implementing organisation needs to take activists on a field test during the training. Such pre-testing of filling up questionnaires gives activists an opportunity to give their feed back on the problems they encounter.
Every activist involved in filling up the questionnaire should clearly understand not only the question but also the objectives and various concepts behind every question.
Before involving the activists, the Social Organisers must be clear about the information that is to be collected from the household and the information that is to be collected by VAC in the village from secondary sources. Moreover, activists are informed about the expected questions and concerns of the community.
The activists need to explain to the community that the implementing organisation is an external agent facilitating the process of information management by the local population. The external organisation is simply looking forward to obtained verified information for feeding into Macro-level information data base at DCIC.
The VAC has to develop its village profile. Staff of the implementing organisation would only explain the instruments and process that would help them in developing and updating the Village Information Boards. The important thing to note is: WHAT WOULD THE VILLAGE BECOME AWARE OF AS A RESULT OF SUCH EXERCISE ON REGULAR BASIS? (e.g. List should be available of key promotional aspects, like OOSC; percentage houses that use iodised salt; latrine coverage status, etc). INFORMATION GATHERING AND ANALYSIS IS A TOOL FOR ACTION AT THE VILLAGE LEVEL SO THAT THEY MAY SEE THE STATUS OF THEIR VILLAGE.
At the end of activists training, activists are assigned to different villages of a UC, and before leaving the training room, every activist knows exactly which village and which Mohallas are he covering. All this is explained with the help of maps on which roads and streets are clearly demarcated so that every activist knows his area. This exercise helps in avoiding duplication, and allocation of specific code number to each household becomes easy.
It is important to note that activist training is as much for transferring the skill of filling up questionnaire and knowledge of CIS as much it is for motivating the activists to enthusiastically take part in the process. It requires building a sense of ownership. Based on previous interaction with some projects, it has been observed that some activists expect some kind of incentive for doing the job. However, it is necessary to dispel the misconception that they would be doing the job for a project – for someone from outside. They need to clearly understand the importance of information at their village level and that gathering information is their job and they have to do it for themselves. Only then can we expect some behavioural change. Otherwise imparting the skill and knowledge about CIS would not do the required trick. Experience shows that highly motivated elected Councillors have worked far better than many other activists.
Sometimes it’s hard for the field workers to bring Activists from different Union Councils for a training activity. The temptation usually is to cover as many activists as possible in one training. However, in cases where UCs have too many villages, or villages are far away from each other, for quality sake it is advisable that Activist training is arranged per UC rather than one training per two or three UCs.
Keeping the nature of required behavioural changes and skills, it is not necessary that the training shall be kept limited to one-day. It may be held in two days, giving activists some time to digest the concept and realise the importance of activity they are going to undertake.
Preparation of action plan is a necessary part of the activists training and they shall be individually handed over the questionnaires. In some cases SOs have selected one activist as supervisors of the rest and handed over all questionnaire for distribution among other activists. Such experiences have negative consequences. So, each individual SOs shall come up with individual Action Plan and be responsible for his work alone.
SOs need to be very careful about activists selection and handing over responsibilities as it also happens that an activist quits his job right in the middle of the activity. At such a situation, new activist needs one-to-one coaching by the respective SO.
Ideally, there should be one activist per Mohalla. In other words, 200 household is an acceptable range for an activists to collect data from. Ideal time frame for doing this much job is 25-30 days as interview for one questionnaire takes about 10 minutes.
1.3 Data gathering
Objective: To avoid CIS becoming a survey activity and to involve community in the triple A process
Outcome: Activists collect data from each household in the village on printed HH questionnaire
Responsibility: Community Activists, supervised by Social Organisers
Data gathering is usually done in the evening when men family members are back from work. It is one of the critical phases of CIS implementation. SOs of the implementing organization have to remain vigilant and do regular follow up of the activists busy in filling up household questionnaires. Follow up by the SOs during the data gathering stage helps in making the activists feel responsible. It also help clarifying some misconceptions or problems in understanding the nature of misunderstood questions, etc. To avoid repetition of some mistake in a large number of questionnaires, follow up by the SO after three or four days into the activist’s work helps a lot. Any mistake identified at this stage would save a lot of time, which may be utilized in correcting all the questionnaires.
SOs also need to ensure that forms have reached every village and every Mohalla of the Union Council. To ensure timely collection of data from all villages, a wise course is to prepare a list of all villages and Mohallas and give the concerned Activists a deadline for information collection according to the number of household in his work plan.
Using their own innovative techniques, some activists have done the job in an amazingly short time. One such activist in IRSP programme area attributed the speed of his work to curiosity in human nature. He used to distribute forms to about twenty households with a short message that Local Government wants these forms filled in three days. By the evening he would receive members from all these households, inquiring about the purpose of these forms. Seizing the opportunity, he would not only explain the CIS but also fill up all questionnaires on the spot.
1.4 Questionnaires editing
Objective: To check the questionnaires on the spot for any mistakes and correct them through the same activists
Outcome: The activists correct the information in the questionnaires found to be lacking some information or if any correction is required
Responsibility: Social Organisers and correction by community activists
The Social Organisers must do whatever editing is possible during the information collection in close collaboration with the activists. Afterwards when questionnaires are collected, SOs need to go through each questionnaire to mark any mistakes of blank areas and for correction by the activists.
Once editing is complete the incomplete or incorrect questionnaires are returned to Activists for necessary corrections.
Areas, which need correction, shall be visibly marked with colour marker so that it is easy both for the activists and staff member to follow up the correction process.
1.5 Physical verification
Objective: To physically verify if the data collected by the activists is correct
Out come: 10% of the data is physically verified through visiting the select households and verified information with women and children
Responsibility: Women Social Organisers of the implementing organisation
Not all the data brought in by the activists would be considered as final. It would be responsibility of the staff members to take 10-15 per cent of the filled questionnaires and personally verify the information for its validity and reliability before punching information into the computer database. Women SOs are good to be involved in this activity as it ensures validity of the information from the household.
Women activists are good to be included in data collection process but the problem is that most of them or either illiterate or unable to move around freely in the community and collect questionnaire from house to house. Verification through women staff not only ensure validity of the information but also ensure that respondents from those very household have really expressed problem of their women family members.
It would, however, be more productive if verification is taken as an on-going, simultaneous activity with data gathering. This way it would be easy to nip any problem in the bud and would also make the activists feel more responsible in time. It is not usually the case, but redoing complete data collection in a village would be too difficult and time consuming if the SOs find out too late that the activists didn’t actually go from hose-to-house to collect information.
1.6 Compiling and using tally sheets
Responsibility: Members of the Village Action Committee
Objective: To have the VAC some sense of ownership and regular involvement
Out come: Members of the Village Action Committee compiles village level information of Talley sheets and keep a record for future use.
When village activists collect information on the prescribed household questionnaires, the community needs to have a record for their use at the CCB or VAC level. For this purpose tally sheets have been prepared which the community use for manually compiling information of the HH Questionnaire. A sample tally sheet is given at Annex-6.
Community keeps completed tally sheets for their record and monitoring. Information to VPBs is compiled from the completed tally sheets.
1.7 Collection of facilities data
Objective: Collect secondary information about village education, health, sanitation and other facilities
Out come: All relevant information of about a village is now completely available to the concerned stakeholders
Responsibility: Social Organisers and members of VAC
The activists are not the right people to collect secondary data because such information is in the possession of government officials in different sectors. The activists would only collect household data on the prescribed questionnaires. At the same time, a VAC would be responsible for collecting secondary information about village facilities, as well as consolidating the Household data. All the village level information would then be used to fill in the Village Profile Board (VPB). The same committee would be actively involved in developing Village Development Planes in different sectors, like health, education, drinking water, sanitation etc. The VAC would also keep updated lists of the Out of School Children (OOSC) with names, father names, sex, age and reasons for not attending going to school.
A checklist village secondary data is annexed as Annex-7. However, experience shows that information about village facilities need to be very comprehensive. Without complete information it is very difficult to sensitise the community and generate interest let alone objective planning to address a specific problem. It has been observed that information from secondary sources play a vital role in planning process. Summary information as given in annex 6 simply indicates if a facility exist or not. For complete information, additional questionnaires would be needed for each facility under each sector. Some sample questionnaires for health, education, and water facilities are annexed as Annex – 8.
Collecting information on village facilities questionnaires is relatively much easy than household information. This organised data gathering is far better than waiting to collect the same information at the time of UC planning through different committees or persons, which has the additional risk of some bias approaches as they see a project or scheme for their village at stake. Moreover, segregating this information collection from the rest of the process may leave database at district level incomplete and disjointed. Incompleteness of information also stalls UC level planning. It is, therefore, highly recommended that questionnaires at annex-8 may be refined and used by the VAC and SOs for collecting complete secondary data for effective planning.
Regarding facilities data, members of VAC/CCB must ensure to collect additional information as to who benefit from a specific facility. What is the reason if majority of the population cannot take advantage of a facility, or a specific group is excluded from benefiting from that facility? What kind of problems are people facing in accessing that facility? Who is responsible for addressing these problems? Are they paying attention to this problem? What action is needed on priority basis? What can the community do in this regard?
Regarding rights issues, the questions to find out details could be:
- What kind of violence is prevalent and who are the victims? (poor, poorest, women, or children).
- What are the main causes of this violence and discrimination, and who can address these issues?
- What is general reaction among the people towards these problems?
- Do the victims have access to legal protection?
Village mapping
Village mapping is an essential part of the CIS process. When the data collection is completed, VAC/CCB gets involved in participatory village mapping. They start with developing Geographical map of the area and showing population, household, geographic features, landmarks, facilities, quarters of the marginalized/poorest of the poor households, etc. Development related problems are them plotted on the same geographical map with different colours. Problems associated with rights and protection issues need also be identified and indicated on the map.
This map would help in identifying root causes of the identified problems and also developing a vision as to what kind of a village they want to see a few years down the road. Issues of the marginalized groups and sections of the population need be identified and brought to fore in separate meetings.
1.8 Consolidation and reporting
Objective: To consolidate information for proper analysis, presentation and planning.
Out come:
- Detail analytical reports are available
- Village and Union Council profiles are prepared
- All the information is depicted on GIS maps for effective utilization
Responsibility: Information Management Section of the concerned implementing organisation
Information consolidation is one method used to improve the effectiveness of communication of complex information and can be assisted by computer based information system. Information systems are in fact, a type of communication system, which select, organise, store and disseminate public knowledge for the purpose of communication of that knowledge users.
The objective of developing information system for community based information under CIS is to provide for information needs or the concerned stakeholders (users) in relation to their given problems with information from given sectors.
The minimum functions or process of CIS are:
- Selection and acquisition f information sources,
- Representation or restructuring of information,
- Organisation, storage, and reporting,
- Retrieval (questions analysis and searching), and
- Dissemination and provision of information services.
For developing that system for CIS, consolidation of data at the office level requires software for data entry and reporting. Household and Village information are entered in separate programmes, which can be conveniently developed in Visual Basic for Access. Data entry and cleaning takes considerable time. Formats need to be developed for the kind of reports required from the database. An expert in database development and GIS mapping is a required at the central office of the implementing organisation.
For completing visual representation of the collected data, implementing organisation as well as DCIC would require GIS data layers, such as UC boundaries, roads, rivers, streams, settlements, health and education facilities, etc. The same person would later on help to link all available data with DCIC at DCO office.
Each District and Union Council should be assigned a unique code so that specific data could easily be extracted from the database. One option for coding on the household questionnaire is to assign District a specific two-digit code, then a two-digit code for Tehsil and then four-digit code for village. For example in 11-02-9876, 11 stands for district, 02 for Tehsil in that district and 9876 for the village. Union council codes for that specific District are part of the computer software. The questionnaire only carries UC name for the convenience of all those who handle that questionnaire. UC code automatically appears and become part of the data when its name is entered in the database. Sample reports are annexed as Annex-9.
The process of data entry begins with arrival of verified questionnaires from the field. Each questionnaire is assigned a four digit household code and data is then entered in the database. Key Punch Operators are used for this purpose. Different fields in the software are bound to avoid wrong entry. Still manager CIS has to clean all data after it is entered by Key Punch Operators. Reports are then generated and all information is shown on visual maps. A sample of GIS map is annexed as Annex 10.
Although different sector specialists would analyse the data for their specific uses. However, general analytical reports need to be generated so that key decision makers do have to go through hundreds of pages of data for find out for themselves where the problem lies. A sample of Analysed data is given at Annex 11.
Manager CIS as a GIS expert has to put village and UC wise data in order for the Social Organiser before they leave for feedback and planning sessions. In this regard, manager CIS has to put adjacent hamlets with a village so that they are not left out of the planning process, as have been experienced in other programmes. This lumping together of adjacent hamlets in main settlements facilitate presentation as well as planning process.
Within Union Council, coding for villages should be in sequence, such as 0010, 0011, 0012, 0013, …. If data from some village in the same UC is still awaited, Manager CIS has to reserve that many codes for the awaited villages before assigning codes to villages in another UC.
Minimum requirement of hardware for the CIS facility at the implementing organisation’s MIS Section is
a. A main server computer (at least P-III Dual Processor, 900 MHz, 512 KB Cache, 3x25 GB SCSI HD, 256 MB Ram, Backup tape, CD Drive, with 10/100 LAN running on NT)
b. Two additional computers for data entry (P-III 866/133 MHz Mini-tower, 128 MB, 20 GB HD, 1.44 MB DD, Zip 100 MB drive 2x drive, 48x CD-ROM drive, Mouse, Keyboard & Compaq V.90 56k PCI modem & Integrated 10/100NIC)
c. HP Laser Jet 4000T
d. Smart UPS, 500v
e. One colour printer A-3 size
f. Plotter (optional).
