R4D Indonesia

Professional assistance during birth and maternal mortality in two Indonesian districts

Wed, 28 Oct 2009 14:43:00 GMT

Miscellaneous C. Ronsmans, S. Scott, S. N. Qomariyah, E. Achadi, D. Braunholtz, T. Marshall, E. Pambudi, K. H. Witten & W. J. Graham 2009 Bulletin of the World Health Organanisation (2009) 87: 416-423 [doi:10.2471/BLT.08.051581] Objective: To examine determinants of maternal mortality and assess the effect of programmes aimed at increasing the number of births attended by health professionals in two districts in West Java, Indonesia.

Methods: We used informant networks to characterize all maternal deaths, and a capture-recapture method to estimate the total number of maternal deaths. Through a survey of recent births we counted all midwives practising in the two study districts. We used casecontrol analysis to examine determinants of maternal mortality, and cohort analysis to estimate overall maternal mortality ratios.

Findings: The overall maternal mortality ratio was 435 per 100 000 live births (95% confidence interval, CI: 376498). Only 33% of women gave birth with assistance from a health professional, and among them, mortality was extremely high for those in the lowest wealth quartile range (2303 per 100 000) and remained very high for those in the lower middle and upper middle quartile ranges (1218 and 778 per 100 000, respectively). This is perhaps because the women, especially poor ones, may have sought help only once a serious complication had arisen.

Conclusion: Achieving equitable coverage of all births by health professionals is still a distant goal in Indonesia, but even among women who receive professional care, maternal mortality ratios remain surprisingly high. This may reflect the limitations of home-based care. Phased introduction of fee exemption and transport incentives to enable all women to access skilled delivery care in health centres and emergency care in hospitals may be a feasible, sustainable way to reduce Indonesias maternal mortality ratio.

Confidential inquiries into maternal deaths: Modifications and adaptations in Ghana and Indonesia

Wed, 28 Oct 2009 14:35:00 GMT

Miscellaneous J. Hussein, L. D'Ambruoso, M. Armar-Klemesu, E. Achadi, D. Arhinful, Y. Izati and J. Ansong-Tornui 2009 International Journal of Gynecology & Obstetrics (2009) 106 (1) 80-84 [doi:10.1016/j.ijgo.2009.04.007] Objective: Factors contributing to the limited use of confidential inquiries into maternal deaths include the negative focus and demotivating effect of such inquiries, perceptions of unavailability of sufficient documentation of events, and lack of time and resources. To ascertain whether these problems can be overcome, variations to confidential inquiries into maternal deaths were introduced in Ghana and Indonesia.

Methods: Clinical review panels were set up as part of the usual process of confidential inquiries, and modifications to the confidential inquiries were introduced. In Ghana, the traditional confidential inquiry process focusing on health facility care was modified to introduce the assessment of positive factors. In addition to the assessment of positive factors, adaptations in Indonesia consisted of including cases of obstetric complications, as well as deaths, and the use of interview testimonials as data sources. Information about resource and time needs for conducting confidential inquiries was collected.

Results: The introduction of positive aspects to the process provided a balanced and more motivating setting for the inquiry. The data obtained from case notes in district hospitals and interview testimonials provided sufficient information to assess why maternal deaths and severe complications occurred. The costs of conducting the inquiries ranged from US $4000 to US $11 000 (per study), and the estimated time required for a panel member to review each case was more than 3 hours.

Conclusion: This study introduced practical ways to encourage the implementation of maternal death reviews, inquiries, and audits that are context specific and, therefore, acceptable to local practitioners.

Development Research Centre for the Future State (Research Scheme R8490) Annual Report 1 July 2008 30 June 2009

Tue, 27 Oct 2009 13:40:00 GMT

Miscellaneous Institute of Development Studies 2009 73 pp.

Progress on the 3 programmes is reported:

1.Public Action and Private Investment
Progress has been steady. Key activities/achievements have included the PAPI 2009 cross cutting workshop attended by representatives of all the major projects. This workshop was also attended by Max Everest Phillips (DfID) and representatives from the Africa Power and Politics RPC and the Institutions for Pro Poor Growth RPC. Closer ties with these RPCs which carry out research in similar themes have been highlighted as having great potential to deepen the research and analysis and vastly improve quality through knowledge sharing activities.

The field research on the 'China's investment in Africa' project was completed and work has now entered a new phase. This project has received a lot of attention from the academic and policy making community. Jing Gu the lead researcher has been highly active in presenting her work and publications are being finalised. Additional funding for this project was recently obtained for the work to continue.

There has been good progress in the Egypt project with a number of publications in the final stages of writing or publication. The projects in Indonesia and Brazil have now been completed with outputs coming from both. The work on particularistic property rights regimes in China is nearing completion. There has been fair progress in the Vietnam project; research partners have been formally identified. With regret the research in Pakistan cannot be completed.

A new project due for completion in March 2010 will attempt to bring some of the key findings of the programme into two publications to answer the core question.

2.Collective Action around Service Delivery (Social Accountability)
Despite good performance as reported in last year's report Modes of Service Delivery in Brazil, India and Mexico (BIM) has experienced some setbacks. It has been formally agreed that Mexico can no longer form part of the project as no researcher of suitable ability could be identified who would be willing to finish the work. There have been some problems with writing up from some of the India researchers, many of whom are younger academics in their early careers. This has led to some delays. Brazil continues to perform well. Despite these setbacks there have been some major achievements especially in the communication of research findings at conferences.

3.State Capacity, Financing the State and Informal Local Governance
Comprising three key research themes (State Capacity, Financing the State and Informal Local Governance), programme three has progressed well over the last year.

There have been some major movements in the taxation work, mainly in communication efforts. The multi country study into the resource curse in Andean countries started and is now nearing completion.

Work into Informal Local Governance institutions has progressed adequately and there is possibility of funding one further stage of work. The multi-country study into donor proliferation in Africa was completed and a research proposal submitted to other funders for follow up work.

Overview of Qualitative Risk Assessments for the Introduction and Spread of HPAI H5N1 Virus

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 11:58:00 GMT

Miscellaneous R. Métras, S. Costard and D. Pfeiffer 2009 HPAI Research Brief No. 8, 2009. 7 pp. This Briefing gives an overview of risk assessments conducted in Ghana, Ethiopia, Kenya, Nigeria and Indonesia between October 2008 and June 2009.

Mapping the Likelihood of Introduction and Spread of Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza Virus H5N1 in Africa and Indonesia using Multicriteria Decision Modelling

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 11:48:00 GMT

Miscellaneous K. Stevens, W. de Glanville, S. Costard, R. Métras, W. Theuri, R. Kruska, T. Randolph, D. Grace, S. Hendrickx, and D. Pfeiffer 2009 HPAI Research Brief No. 7, 2009. 6 pp This brief summarizes the methodology used to produce HPAI risk maps for continental Africa and Indonesia, and the findings.

Pro-Poor HPAI Risk Reduction Strategies: Synthesis of Country Background Papers

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 11:41:00 GMT

Miscellaneous M. M. Tiongco 2009 HPAI Research Brief No. 6, 2009. 14 pp. This brief is a synopsis of five country background papers that provided an inventory of information about the importance of the poultry sector in the economy and for rural livelihoods, the structure of the poultry sector and the associated level of biosecurity, and the threats and incidences of highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI), along with prevention and control measures that were implemented and the institutional response capacity. The countries investigated were Ethiopia, Ghana, Indonesia, Kenya, and Nigeria.

Knowledge and Practices of Indonesian Rural Communities and Poultry Farmers Toward Avian Flu.

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 11:21:00 GMT

Miscellaneous Y. Yakhshilikov, M. Tiongco, C. Narrod, and J. Friedman 2009 HPAI Research Brief No. 17, 2009. 6 pp The knowledge and perceptions about and toward HPAI of poor Indonesian households are investigated by asking the following questions: What do poor communities and poultry farmers perceive about the risk of HPAI infections to them and their poultry? What do they think are the factors or drivers of disease transmission? What are their practices for handling sick, infected, or dead birds? It is found that even though rural households and poultry producers are highly aware of HPAI, their knowledge of HPAI symptoms is limited and their knowledge about transmission, preventive measures, and disposal methods are variable.

A Contingent Valuation Study on Indonesian Farmers Willingness to Accept Compensation for Poultry

Fri, 16 Oct 2009 11:12:00 GMT

Miscellaneous Y. Yakhshilikov, E. Birol, M. Tiongco, C. Narrod, and J. Friedman 2009 HPAI Research Brief No. 18, 2009. 6 pp. This brief presents the results of a contingent valuation (CV) study that aimed at capturing farmers willingness to accept (WTA) compensation for birds with three different health statuses due to an HPAI outbreak1) healthy, 2) risky, or 3) sick. The differences among farmers willingness to accept compensation for these three types of birds could indicate the extent of the economic costs that may be borne by farmers in the case of an HPAI outbreak. Moreover, the WTA compensation levels could be used to inform the design of efficient, effective, and equitable compensation schemes. This study also investigated that the impact of farmers knowledge, attitudes, and perceptions (KAP) of HPAI as well as their poultry-production and household-level characteristics on their WTA compensation (i.e., the HPAI costs that they would bear).

WEMC Annual Report. 1 July 2008 30 June 2009

Thu, 15 Oct 2009 15:05:00 GMT

Miscellaneous WEMC 2009 WEMC Secretariat, Southeast Asia Research Centre (SEARC), Hong Kong, China, 85 pp.

With regard to progress on intended outputs the research capacity of 228 individuals has been enhanced; 13 English-language and 10 other language publications printed/in press; the published and widely distributed research framework has been positively received; comparative analysis has commenced. WEMC research products are being used in over 100 institutions; an integrated action research methodology dialectically combining research, capacity building and communication of findings has strengthened women as rights claimants; findings and analyses have enabled evidence based communication with diverse audiences from the grassroots to international policy makers.

Impact of the research programme
Significant progress has been made towards WEMC's purpose to help build 'a sustained growing critical mass of civil society expertise engaged in policy debates for long-term changes in policies and practices that promote women's empowerment in Muslim contexts.' By June 2009, some 10 WEMC specific (or sets of) research-derived recommendations had been accepted and implemented in Pakistan, Indonesia, Iran, and China as well as for migrant women workers in Hong Kong and Indonesia. This year, four new sets of/specific recommendations were accepted by government authorities. Previously accepted recommendations started being implemented. Importantly, research findings are being requested by policy-makers and forums.

Enhanced analytical and communication skills enabled women to successfully negotiate expanded rights, demand expanded/better service delivery and accountability from meso-level government duty bearers (China, Indonesia, migrant workers, Pakistan). WEMC has transformed the approaches of government extension workers (Indonesia and Pakistan) and service providers (Iran). At the RPC level, in August 2008, key WEMC concepts and research results were communicated to UN ESCAP policy-makers at a WEMC-focused forum (Where's the power in women's empowerment?) and followed up by invited inputs to the UN Beijing+15 review process.

Research confirms WEMC's hypothesis that the greatest obstacles to women's empowerment operate at the meso level and that, somewhat counter-intuitively, women's priority expressed need is to have their own spaces for collective strategising, rather than improved linkages with government institutions. If cultural considerations, including interpretations of Islam and 'Muslim' women, are critical factors that keep women immobilized and disempowered, women's own counter-strategies of empowerment are diverse. Women's demands for different sets of rights derive legitimacy from constitutional rights and a re-orientation of cultural concepts as well as religious interpretations.

Enhanced capacity provides women a new/stronger voice in formal and non-formal forums, impacting developmental and governance processes. Women are questioning the dominant discourse culturally justifying women's disempowerment, reorienting religious instruction forums as well as secular arenas; women have started to speak out on empowerment on local radio, television and at public events, including in dialogues with officials.

WEMC has seeded multiplication. To date, at least 20 new initiatives directly catalysed, facilitated or inspired by WEMC transformative new knowledge processes, have emerged supported by reliable, non-DFID resources. Shaped by the research process and informed by findings, these vital meso-level discursive spaces for women's collective sharing and analyses of experiences are enabling indigenous strategies for women's empowerment to be forged, implemented and replicated. WEMC-catalysed collective spaces include five women's self-help groups in Indonesia, eight new Pakistani organisations, a young women lawyers' group and a young people's media group in Iran. In China, 'safe spaces' have developed in the form of a 'health centre', a handicraft initiative created within an academic institution (Gansu Academy of Social Sciences) and around traditional religious spaces. Among Afghan refugees and returnees, research led to a self-help teachers' group. An exciting WEMC-inspired international initiative is the 'Institute for Women's Empowerment', established and registered by several RPC members to:
a. Document and make visible women's empowerment initiatives in different communities and countries
b. Develop women's strategies for empowerment at multiple levels c. Communicate lessons on women's strategies for empowerment for replication and upscaling
d. Build the capacity of civil society groups in multiple countries to advance womens empowerment

IWE is collaborating with the international coordination office of Women Living Under Muslim Laws (WLUML) in the programme 'Women reclaiming and re-defining culture: asserting rights over body, self and public places.'

Appedices to Final Technical Report. Epidemiology and population structure of Phytophthora species causing diseases of coconut in Indonesia.

Mon, 05 Oct 2009 11:01:00 GMT

Miscellaneous Smith, J.; Flood, J. 2001 CABI Bioscience UK Centre Egham, Surrey, UK. The documents attached are the separate Appendices to the Final Technical Report for project R6766.

The nature, extent and eradication of homelessness in developing countries

Fri, 17 Apr 2009 13:34:00 GMT

Completed An in-depth study of homelessness in nine developing countries (Bangladesh, South Africa, China, Zimbabwe, India, Indonesia, Egypt, Ghana and Peru) was conducted. The nine countries chosen for the study presented a range of housing and homelessness situation and degrees of poverty. They gave a range of different cultural experiences and understanding of housing and homelessness. To establish the nature and extent of homelessness in developing countries; to formulate workable definitions of homelessness suitable for developing country situations; to identify innovative practice in eradicating homelessness, in ameliorating its effects and in getting people off the streets; to disseminate findings through electronic and paper means. This will be done in relation to children as well as adults. The international conference on 'Homelessness: A Global Perspective', India Habitat Centre, New Delhi, India, 9-13 January 2006 was developed to disseminate the current findings and to identify ways to take the work forward.

Responses to avian influenza in Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand and Indonesia

Mon, 23 Mar 2009 01:00:00 GMT

New papers from the STEPS Centre examine responses to avian influenza in Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand and Indonesia.

Going to Scale: The Potential of Community-led Total Sanitation

Tue, 03 Feb 2009 13:44:00 GMT

Current Sanitation remains one of the biggest development challenges in developing countries. Around 6,000 people, mainly children under five, die everyday due to poor sanitation, hygiene and water.

Sanitation-related diseases such as diarrhoea and cholera continue to seriously undermine human health and well-being, particularly in South Asia where 900 million people have no access to adequate sanitation. Improving sanitation is therefore key to achieving the health-related Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) of reducing child mortality and combating disease.

In recent years, the impact of the Community led Total Sanitation (CLTS) approach has drawn significant attention. At the heart of this approach is a shift away from the focus on supporting toilet construction for individual households, to an approach that seeks to create open defecation free villages through an emphasis on attitudinal and behaviour change of the whole community. CLTS is an approach in which people in rural communities are facilitated to do their own appraisal and analysis of their sanitation situation and the extent and consequences of open defecation. They are not instructed or taught but allowed to come to their own conclusions, and take their own action.

In its classical form, a small team of facilitators conduct a triggering. The facilitators may be government, NGO or project staff, or Natural Leaders from other communities. The PRA (Participatory Rural Appraisal) principle that they can do it is fundamental and PRA methods are used. These include participatory mapping on the ground to show where people live and where they defecate, transect walks to visit and stand in those places, calculations of quantities of shit (the crude local word is used) produced by each household and the community, and identifying pathways to the mouth leading to the shocking recognition that we are eating one anothers shit. This triggering is designed to facilitate the communities recognition of the negative externalities to all as a consequence of the sanitary practices of some, and thus lead to a moment of ignition and a collective decision and action to end open defecation. When triggering is successful, Natural Leaders emerge. People dig holes and build latrines. There are no standard models and construction is by self-help.

There is a growing recognition that this approach offers tremendous potential for developing countries to achieve their MDG targets for sanitation. This has resulted in this approach spreading from Bangladesh where it originated in 2000 to India, Indonesia, Cambodia, Pakistan and Nepal in Asia; Egypt, Ethiopia, Kenya, Malawi, Nigeria, Sierra Leone, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia in Africa, Bolivia in Latin America and Yemen in the Middle East.

OBJECTIVE:
To make a difference by reducing the deprivation and enhancing the wellbeing of poor people through research to generate knowledge and insights concerning CLTS, through participatory action research engaging with practice, and through the sharing of knowledge, experience and insights across communities, organisations and countries.

PROJECT AIMS

Research to understand on-the-ground realities of CLTS and issues of spread, scale and quality
The research examines some of the core assumptions of CLTS around hardware subsidies, local notions of sanitation/hygiene, facilitation, sustainability and replicability. It is concerned with identifying on-the-ground realities through interdisciplinary research drawing on sociological, anthropological and political and institutional analysis. The project involves research in communities with and without CLTS, and in various stages of moving towards it, looking at the processes of ignition, adoption, dissemination and spread, local dynamics within communities, the effects of Government and NGO programmes with and without subsidy or other inducements, and the relationships between bureaucratic norms and imperatives, and programmes at the community level. Another issue for consideration is the social and physical sustainability of total sanitation. The research will seek to identify the most favourable conditions under which total sanitation can be achieved.
Participatory action learning to engage with practice and improve processes and outcomes
Participatory Action Learning engages with the facilitators and implementing organisations (both NGOs and governments) in ways which will enhance learning and improve practice and policy. Areas of attention include the selection, training and mentoring of facilitators; processes of preparation, ignition and follow up and support; forms of support for external and also community facilitators, networking at local and other levels, and overcoming obstacles.
Networking and sharing between organisations and countries to influence policy and practice
The aim of the networking and influencing component is to optimise the exchange of experiences and learning and to have an impact on policy. The networking activities facilitate sharing, learning and functional linkages between and across organisations, programmes and countries via Sharing and Learning workshops, presentations at UK and international events to share research findings and policy-relevant lessons, experiences and insights, a CLTS mailing list and a website. The CLTS website www.communityledtotalsanitation.org serves as a global hub for CLTS, connecting the network of practitioners, communities, NGOs, agencies, researchers, governments, donors and others involved or interested in CLTS. The site, which contains practical information about the approach, information on CLTS in different countries, research papers, relevant news and events and many other useful materials, serves as an up-to-date virtual resource centre and a space for sharing and learning on CLTS across organisations, countries and sectors. The site reflects the rich, varied and dynamic nature of the approach and hopes to encourage debate around key aspects of CLTS in order to improve policy and practice. The CLTS website is populated with contributions from those engaged and interested in CLTS around the world.

Book on CLTS
Website hot topic on CLTS on livelihoods connect (now replaced by www.communityledtotalsanitation.org)
Establishment of a CLTS network
IDS Working Papers on CLTS and related issues
Events to facilitate sharing and learning on CLTS
Practical publications (eg Handbook on CLTS)

Through generating cutting edge knowledge on CLTS and sanitation, and ensuring that lessons are learnt and shared across countries and organisations, the project supports the development and spread of good CLTS practices and supportive policies which will contribute to major gains in human wellbeing and help to address the MDGs.

The research that has been carried out by IDS and its partners in Bangladesh, India and Indonesia will be published in the form of research papers and a book on CLTS in 2009.

The main output of the action learning to date has been the CLTS Handbook published by Plan (UK) and IDS.

Networking activities have established an active and well-connected global CLTS network with linkages and partnerships across organisations, sectors, countries and continents; linking practitioners, researchers, policymakers, governments, NGOs and donors, facilitating exchanges of experience and information with the aim of contributing to policy and practice. Goodwill, momentum and interest have focused on the CLTS website which is the core global resource for CLTS. A new website dedicated to CLTS, which replaces the old hot topic on livelihoods connect, was launched in December 2008: www.communityledtotalsanitation.org.

Sharing and Learning Workshops on CLTS (at SACOSAN II and III and AfricaSan+5).
Workshop reports:

Bongartz, Petra (forthcoming) One Day Sharing and Learning Workshop on Community-Led Total Sanitation (CLTS), 17th November 2008, Workshop Report.
Bongartz, Petra (2008) CLTS Sharing and Learning Workshop at AfricaSan, Durban, South Africa, 17th February 2008
Bongartz, Petra (2007) CLTS Workshop at SACOSAN II (Second South Asian Conference on Sanitation), Islamabad, Pakistan, 19th September 2006.
Chambers, Robert (2008) Durban remarks: Lessons learned with CLTS, 19th February 2008.
A global conference on CLTS (December 2008) to present research findings, take stock of global developments and experiences with and research on CLTS, and mark the end of the Year of Sanitation.

Tropical forests in poverty alleviation: from household data to global-comparative analysis

Thu, 15 Jan 2009 10:53:00 GMT

Current Forests are important to the rural livelihoods of poor people in developing countries. But due to the paucity of quality data on rural household economies in the tropics and sub-tropics, we know very little about just how important forests are, for what specific purposes they primarily serve, and for how many people forests are vital assets. This impedes the design of effective strategies for forest-based poverty alleviation. This project aims to fill these serious empirical gaps by using a uniform methodology to gather high-quality primary household data in about 25 sites with tropics-wide coverage. The global data bank (5-6000 households) with complete annualized income information and other economic and non-economic data will be used for a global-comparative analysis of forest-poverty linkages in rural household economies. Our goal is to analyse the general importance of various forest types in different aspects of rural livelihoods, identify major causes of geographical variation, and point to tangible options for interventions that actively enhance forest-based poverty alleviation. Specifically, we will test for hypotheses related to the alleged pro-poor role of market integration and of collective forest mangement at the local level. The data will also enable tests of broader microeconomic hypotheses regarding the role of natural resources in rural livelihoods, e.g. to what extent natural resources serve as seasonal gap-fillers, as safety nets in response to shocks, and as means of accumulating assets that eventually can lift people out of poverty. The project is integrated into the Poverty and Environment Network (PEN), coordinated by the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR). PEN is an ongoing collaborative research effort between CIFOR, a network of PhD students, and external experts from ten universities including the University of East Anglia. PEN data collection is already advanced; we thus seek financial support over a three-year period mainly to establish a global data bank, to undertake the global-comparative data analysis, and to carry out synthesis & dissemination work. Research results will be communicated through a variety of media to the main intended beneficiaries that include academia, donors, multilaterals, and policy makers at different levels. The primary project objective is:
I. To undertake a comprehensive global-comparative analysis of the role of forests and environmental income in preventing and reducing rural poverty, built on a centrally coordinated pan-tropical data bank with high-quality primary household and village data collected though PEN (research outputs);
The secondary project objectives are:
II. To elaborate recommendations for tangible forest-poverty interventions, and feed them into national and global policy processes (policy impacts);
III. To enhance the ability of project partners in using best-practice methods for conducting income-accounting rural household surveys, and to suggest improved research methodologies for future studies of environmental incomes and rural livelihoods (capacity building and methodological innovation).

Do taxes help make better governments?

Fri, 09 Jan 2009 01:00:00 GMT

Are there connections between how states obtain money and the quality of their governance? If governments are not dependent on taxes for their finance, new research suggests they are less accountable and responsive to their citizens and taxpayers

Financing primary health care

Mon, 09 Jun 2008 01:00:00 GMT

id21 insights health #12 explores the challenges facing donors and national governments in providing and financing primary health care for all

Centre for the Future State - Phase 2

Wed, 12 Dec 2007 17:26:00 GMT

Current The primary purpose of the Development Research Centre for the Future State is to harness the ideas and the research skills of applied social science researchers, in both developing and developed countries, to assist in finding ways of achieving the Millennium Development Goals by increasing the accountability and effectiveness of public authority in the South. The secondary purpose is to contribute to enhancing the capacity of researchers to perform this role by (a) helping to upgrade research and communication skills, especially for younger researchers from developing countries, and (b) strengthening an institutional framework that permits and encourages researchers from South and North to work together to share resources and collectively to define and implement applied research programmes. To harness the ideas and the research skills of applied social science researchers, in both developing and developed countries, to assist policymakers and citizens to find ways of increasing the accountability and effectiveness of public authority in the South. Policy-relevant research. This is the core activity, and constitutes the intellectual and organisational framework around which the other activities will be organised.

Dissemination and policy-influencing activities. The project has a very good record in this field and has begun to invest more heavily in these activities, in particular in the activities of the Synthesis Task Force.

Capacity Building. The approach and plans are that the major investments in this area will be on increasing the capacity of younger Southern researchers to undertake high quality policy-relevant research, and to communicate their findings to various audiences.

Inequality, Human Security and Ethnicity Research Centre DRC (CRISE)

Tue, 20 Nov 2007 00:00:00 GMT

Current The purpose of the Centre is to investigate relationships between ethnicity, inequality and conflict, with the aim of identifying economic, political, social and cultural policies which promote stable and inclusive multi-ethnic societies.

It is crucial to shed light on these issues, since in many countries conflicts linked to ethnicity have become major elements in impoverishment, undermining human security and sustainable development. Ethnicity - often seen in terms of racial, religious or tribal belonging - is of pervasive and growing significance, particularly in the context of declining authoritarian rule and increasing democratisation. Yet it has been relatively neglected in development research.

Through in-depth comparative country studies, the Centre investigates why ethnic divisions become entrenched in some societies, but are of less significance in others, analyzing the political and economic circumstances which lead people to use ethnicity to achieve their objectives, and exploring the role of unequal access to economic and political resources in provoking ethnic mobilization. It will investigate why some multicultural societies achieve inclusive stable political and economic systems, while elsewhere ethnic divisions lead to violence and forced migration, undermining development and causing abysmal poverty. To investigate relationships between ethnicity, inequality and conflict, with the aim of identifying economic, political, social and cultural policies which promote stable and inclusive multi-ethnic societies.

Below is a list of policy documents which draw on and use the concept of Horizontal Inequalities.

UNDP Crisis Prevention and Recovery Report 2008: Post-Conflict Economic Recovery - Enabling Local Ingenuity. The report says that "successful post-conflict recovery requires not only sustained economic growth, but also a pattern of growth that is likely to reduce the risk of conflict recurrence. As such, growth must be accompanied by employment expansion and must address horizontal inequalities where these are severe."

DFID White Paper 2006 - Preventing Violent Conflict acknowledges that social exclusion and ethnic discrimination are major causes of conflict.

2006 GTZ Germany - Conflict Prevention and Peace Building Elements of PSD/SED Programmes explores how their programmes can reduce the risk of conflict in cooperating countries. Reduction in horizontal inequalities is mentioned several times.

2005 Human Development Report - International Cooperation at a Crossroads: Aid, trade and security in an unequal world explicitly mentions horizontal inequalities as a cause of conflict and a major challenge of conflict-prone countries.

2005 World Bank - Toward Conflict-Sensitive Poverty Reduction Strategy: Lessons from a retrospective analysis (Report No. 32587) mentions horizontal inequalities as cause of conflict and notes they must be taken into account.

2004 Afghanistan Human Development Report Security with a Human Face: Challenges and Responsibilities warns that "horizontal inequalities could renew deep-rooted conflicts."

The upcoming Nepal national human development report will rely heavily on CRISE work on horizontal inequalities.

Other evidence of impact:

During the launch of the CRISE book on Horizontal Inequalities and Conflict: Understanding Group Violence in Multiethnic Countries (Palgrave) DFID Permanent Secretary Minouche Shafik described how CRISE research led to a fundamental change in DFID's aid programmes in Nepal. Video/audio of the launch can be accessed here.

Three CRISE working papers have been included in a CD-Rom of Essential Reading on Conflict, compiled by the Governance and Social Development Resource Centre, which will be distributed to development practitioners working on conflict around the world.

Women's Empowerment in Muslim Contexts (WEMC)

Tue, 20 Nov 2007 00:00:00 GMT

Current

The Research Programme Consortium on 'Women's empowerment in Muslim contexts: gender, poverty and democratisation from the inside out' (WEMC) was formed to address this knowledge gap - that is, 'how to achieve women's empowerment', especially in the face of disempowering forces, old and new.

WEMC defines women's empowerment as an increase in their capacity to make autonomous decisions to challenge or transform power relations that impede gender equality. It contends that conventional development interventions ignore power structures standing between women and the state.

The aim of the WEMC research programme is to understand women's indigenous strategies for empowerment in ways that could transform unfavourable power relations. New knowledge from the RPCs should be effectively communicated to key policy makers and development practitioners. The research objectives are to document, analyse and multiply women's empowerment strategies; to make visible, validate and strengthen women's agency, and to build analytical capacity and strategic alliances.

The RPC's new knowledge is communicated effectively and persuasively, through diverse means and products, to key policy makers, implementers, decision- makers, development practitioners, and other agents of change.

The capacity of civil society groups and networks is developed in ways that enhance their critical analyses of changing environments, as well as their growing engagement for women-centred transformations in policy and practice.

The RPC's ground-breaking, high-quality and coherent new knowledge transforms understanding of women's empowerment in Muslim contexts, with particular relevance for the MDGs and the Beijing Platform for Action.

Since its inception, the programme has been successful in generating a "growing critical mass of civil society expertise engaged in policy debates for long-term changes in policies and practices that promote women's empowerment in Muslim contexts". In fact the achievements far exceed the initial 'targets' set. These can be seen in the successful implementation and integrated outcomes of the research, communication and capacity building thrusts of the programme.

The publication of the seminal WEMC framework (2008) has certainly added a new and valuable dimension to the notion and understanding of empowerment as a "relational, qualitative phenomenon shaped by contesting forces, not a quantity to have in incremental amounts". Often times in current development discourses, the term 'empowerment' has been appropriated by funders and development agencies which seek to 'measure' a dynamic process almost impossible to quantify. By problematising empowerment in diverse Muslim contexts, in its multi-layered, multi-lingual and multi-dimensional forms, the research thrust has highlighted the non-linear resistances of women to disempowering forces as well as their individual, collective and institutionalised mobilisations to empower themselves and their communities. About 50 papers and/or policy reports in both English and local languages have been produced, not including a variety of multi-media products - a number way above the set targets. Many of the research findings have been presented and very well received in conferences and workshops and in different media forms to a wide variety of audiences. Indeed this knowledge and movement building project has been made possible by the dynamic synergies of the partners who are mainly scholar activists or committed women activists with vast community and research experiences.

The communications work has been interesting and exciting. A coherent communications strategy was developed during the inception phase to ensure that the communication of research findings was fully embedded into the overall research programme. There has been continued discussion and consultation and the strategy continuously updated. The strategy has ensured that the communications activities are planned with key audiences and messages identified.

Communications activities have taken placed at the micro level with women in the research sites; at the meso level to influence local policy and decision makers and at the national and international level. The range of media used from academic articles to film and radio has been impressive. There are clear indications that the new knowledge has been communicated effectively and persuasively. Now with less than two years left, the programme needs to focus on identifying and communicating the key research findings.

The programme has made great progress in meeting the specific capacity building output. The programme has been very successful at enhancing many skills. However there are a number of the more analytical skills such as drawing out research findings and distilling key messages where there is still a need for more work. The programme has spent a considerable amount of effort on building capacity at the organisational level and the results have been impressive. The programme has recognised that it is not enough to just build the capacity at the individual and organisational levels but that there is a need to address issues in respect to the political, social and the regulatory context that the individual and organisations work. WEMC had identified this need and has decided to focus on "building alliances to strengthen institutions".

Initiative for Maternal Mortality Programme Assessment (IMMPACT)

Tue, 20 Nov 2007 00:00:00 GMT

Current 1. Enhanced methods and tools for measuring maternal mortality and other relevant outcomes
2. New evidence on effective and cost effective strategies to reduce maternal mortality and severe morbidity that are supportive of, and supported by, heath systems and communities
3. Stronger capacity in developing countries for evidence based decision making and for rigorous outcome evaluation. 3. Stronger capacity in developing countries for evidence based decision making and for rigorous outcome evaluation. This project is now completed with the results influential in high level UN meeting Sept 08.

Results included:
New low cost, appropriate method of calculating maternal mortality

Informed skilled attendance
Strategies to achieve MDG5 at national & international levels. E.g. the Global Campaign for Health MDGs & the WHO Making Pregnancy Safer strategy by creating the new priority of "Quality Facility Births."

New knowledge on the magnitude, causes & consequences of the burden at sub-national levels. E.g robust evidence on the disproportionate burden - physical, financial & social - borne by the poorest women & their families.

Evidence to inform policies to reduce financial barriers to obstetric care. E.g. fee exemption policies in Senegal & Nepal, the National Health Insurance scheme in Ghana, and UNICEF's new policy on user fees.

Provide expert advice to major stakeholders at national & international levels. E.g. with two major NGOs White Ribbon Alliance & Amnesty International to strengthen the use of sound evidence in advocacy.

Immpact has developed a company at University of Aberdeen iPact to communicate results. Its technical advisory arm has, since 2008, trained over 80 programme officers from 22 developing countries in monitoring & evaluation principles & practice.

Developed practical tools for evaluating the inputs, processes & outcomes of maternal health programmes. E.g. enabled maternal mortality to be estimated robustly at sub-national levels, in the community and in health facilities, through five new instruments.

Pro-Poor Policy Options to Control Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI) in Africa and South East Asia

Tue, 20 Nov 2007 00:00:00 GMT

Current Since its emergence, H5N1 HPAI has attracted considerable public and media attention because the viruses involved have been shown to be capable of producing fatal disease in humans, which gives rise to the fear that the virus might acquire the capacity for sustained human-to-human transmission and thus cause a global influenza pandemic.

Driven by the fear of a possible human pandemic, responses to HPAI outbreaks have generally been top-down, heavy handed government interventions. Control measures have centred on stamping out which may entail large scale culling of infected flocks and in-contact flocks and the high concentration of poultry in certain areas has led to the culling of millions of animals at great expense. For low income countries in which poultry is raised primarily by smallholders, who are often poor, such measures constitute a serious burden, and thus lead to socially unjust outcomes and/or be undermined.

In order to improve local and global and capacity for making evidence-based decisions on the control of HPAI (and other diseases with epidemic potential), which inevitably have major social and economic impacts in particular on the poor, the UK Department for International Development (DFID) has funded a multi-disciplinary and collaborative HPAI research project in Southeast Asia and Africa.

The DFID-funded research programme focuses on Africa and Southeast Asia and will examine the best ways to control avian flu but also how to reduce the impact of the disease on poor peoples' livelihoods, for example through farmer compensation schemes.

This pioneering research will help find ways of helping the poor while also ensuring appropriate control measures are followed so that farmers do not hide, slaughter or eat infected birds.

1. Deeper understanding of HPAI risk

The risk of disease in livestock populations is a result of biological processes and economic behaviour of livestock keepers and traders. Current control regimes promoted by policy makers respond primarily to biological disease characteristics, while private actors, who have a major role to play in disease control, respond primarily to economic incentives. To more effectively manage HPAI risks in areas, in which the disease has become established, and thereby to limit local economic damage and wider implications of disease propagation and supply chain disruption, a deeper understanding of the interactions between animal health promotion and the economics of livestock production and marketing is needed. The first objective of this project is to provide such insights from detailed and rigorous field research.

2. Emphasis on institutions and livelihoods.

Disease outbreaks and control measures affect not only animal health but livelihoods. In developing countries, extensively raised backyard livestock are an essential source of both food security and livelihood support. This means that control measures will animate complex responses at the local level, responses that can undermine both programme effectiveness and economic wellbeing of the poor. To manage this risk in ways that are both biologically and socially effective thus requires detailed understanding of both disease epidemiology and institutions.

3. Substantive and innovative policy guidance

HPAI is not unprecedented, but early responses to this disease indicate that a new generation of policies are needed to address this animal and public health risk. Despite determined early eradication efforts, outbreaks continue on a now regular cycle and in some areas the disease appears to have become endemic. Evidence also suggests that conventional control measures have unintended and at times unanticipated behavioural consequences that undermine their effectiveness and compound negative economic consequences, particularly with respect to sustainable smallholder livelihoods. With this in mind, the project will focus on substantive recommendations from direct evidence regarding poultry production, distribution, processing, and marketing systems. This kind of integrated health and behavioural approach is a significant innovation that can support new policies to combat a larger universe of transboundary animal diseases (TADs) and at the same time address the needs of poor majorities in the subject countries. Both rural and urban poor populations need a secure and affordable food supply, and smallholder farmers need to be recognized as part of the solution to protecting a global commons of disease freedom.

1. Increased awareness by public, private, and tertiary sector organizations of the contribution of poultry to rural livelihoods and of the social impacts of alternative disease control strategies.

2. A set of effective and socially fair options and implementation strategies for HPAI control that work in different settings under different types of production arrangements and for different types of producers.

3. Risk and consequences of HPAI for different regions and stakeholders understood.

Africa and Indonesia:

Descriptive reports on the HPAI situation, control measures and the impact on livelihoods completed for all study countries.
Household level CBAs will be completed in all 5 study countries by April 2010.
Risk maps and pathways produced for each study country.
* Qualitative risk assessment will be ready by autumn 2009.

Mekong countries:

Detailed studies of smallholder poultry value chains have been completed in all three countries.
Spatial disease spread and changes therein analysed for northern Vietnam and Thailand. Analysis for southern Vietnam is underway.
Ex-post stratified impact assessment of HPAI control strategy has been carried out for all three countries.
* Review and modelling of economic and epidemiological impacts of vaccination against HPAI is close to finalization.
Literature review of HPAI transmission pathways from birds to humans finalized.
Literature review of the economic impact of HPAI and control measures in developing countries published by CABI.

1. The strategic framework of the One World One Health initiative pays attention to livelihoods aspects of disease control and picks up multidisciplinary and localized approaches to disease control as promoted by the DFID HPAI research program.

2. UNSIC repeatedly stresses livelihoods impacts of HPAI control [e.g. see interview on program website http://www.hpai-research.net/index.html]

3. Work is being published/cited, in particular the study of compensation issues by WB/FAO/IFPRI/OIE.

4. NGOs such as CARE and AVSF are focusing their HPAI-related interventions on the protection of the livelihoods of smallholder poultry producers.

5. Vietnam and Thailand have revised their culling strategies leading to much slighter livelihoods impacts.

6. Vietnam interested in scaling up the pilot project on the certification of safe poultry production carried out by the research project.

International review of bacterial wilt caused by Pseudomonas solanacearum

Tue, 20 Nov 2007 00:00:00 GMT

Completed This project was originally established as a one year study with three objectives:
To carry out a detailed international-scale review on bacterial wilt caused by P.solanacearum in order to provide a comprehensive account of the present knowledge base and guide future work, bring together information about crop losses, foster international collaboration between DFID-funded research projects and overseas institutes and adapt and implement inputs from these projects to national agricultural programmes.
To initiate research on strains of Pseudomonas recently identified as the cause of bacterial diseases of banana in Indonesia and the Philippines, establish specific research goals and priorities and identify potential collaborating institutes.
To review the prospects for renewed DFID research on coconut lethal yellowing disease, which is actively spreading in Central America and threatens cultivation throughout Central and South America.
Additional duties were to assess requirements and coordinate inputs for research on other bacterial diseases, so as to provide greater continuity of research, improve access to UK expertise for overseas research groups and encourage broader application of research results.
The project was extended to two years in March, 1990 to allow completion of overseas travel, follow up research proposals with contacts made during the review missions, completion of the P.solanacearum review publication and increased research input to a related project (X0071). International review of bacterial wilt caused by Pseudomonas solanacearum Survey visits were made to the Americas, Caribbean and E.Africa and collaborative links established with national research programmes in Kenya, Rwanda, Sudan, Ethiopia, Mexico and Grenada and with CIP in Peru. Bacterial isolates were obtained from these sources and used to set up a centralised culture collection and database for Pseudomonas solanacearum and related organisms. Screening of the collection for bacteriophage and bacteriocins was started and temperate phage were isolated from several cultures.

Isolates of the bacterium causing banana blood disease in Indonesia were characterised. Results showed that this organism differed from strains of P.solanacearum causing Moko disease in the Americas and it will be described as the new sub-species.

The status of coconut lethal yellowing in Mexico was reviewed and a proposal was made for renewed research on the disease, to take advantage of improved diagnostic techniques.

Strain identification, detection of latent infection and integrated control of P.solanacearum are problems requiring particular attention. International efforts are needed to compare banana diseases in America and Asia and investigate new sources of resistance, and to limit the impact of coconut lethal yellowing disease on small farmers in Mexico and Central America.

Variation in rice tungro viruses

Tue, 20 Nov 2007 00:00:00 GMT

Completed Rice tungro virus disease (RTVD) is the most important virus disease of rice in South and South East Asia. Information on the variability of the two viruses responsible is required if conventional and biotechnology-based approaches to RTVD control are to be deployed successfully. Virus isolates were obtained from eight countries of South and South East Asia. Differences were detected between some isolates of rice tungro spherical virus (RTSV) by cross hybridisation of PCR fragments of the three coat protein genes. Cross hybridisation of genomic clones of rice tungro bacilliform virus (RTBV) distinguished between isolates from ASEAN countries and those from the Indian sub-continent in which there was a deletion of ca. 60 nucleotides. The difference was exploited in developing a PCR-based test to differentiate between the two groups. The wider objective of this project is to develop methods for identifying and distinguishing viruses and their strains for use in plant breeding and plant protection programmes
to provide information for the introduction of non-conventional crop resistance.
The immediate objectives are
To obtain information on which strains of tungro can be deliminated by assessing strain variation of both RIBV and RISV at the viral genome level
to make diagnostic tools available to plant pathologists and agricultural advisors. There appear to be two major geographic variants (strains) of RTBV, one from the Indian subcontinent and the other from South East Asia. This finding has considerable implications on the epidemiology of the virus. Recent experiments also indicated that there might be variation within each of these strains. There is also variation in RTSV in the region of the genome encoding the coat protein this showed both in cross hybridisation of cDNAs and in serological analysis. The variation does not show such a clear geographical relationship as does that of RTBV indicating differences in the epidemiology of the two viruses. Characterise isolates of RTBV from S and SE Asian countries where rice tungro disease is prevalent.

Examine the variation of RTBV from different geographical locations within S and SE Asia.

Develop tests to differentiate strains of RTBV for use in less developed countries.

Determine whether RTBV has a mealybug vector in addition to the known leafhopper vectors. Isolates of rice tungro viruses have been obtained from The Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Bangladesh and India. Testing various perennial Oryza spp. for susceptibility to the tungro viruses and suitability for long term maintenance of the isolates have been performed. Oryza rufipogon is showing promise in this respect.

Initial analysis of rice cv TN1 indicates that the Delhi isolate gives more severe symptoms then the type isolate from the Philippines and the Bangladesh isolate less severe symptoms still.

Mapping and sequence data on the two viruses were needed for genome comparisions. Sequence of the whole genome of the type isolate of RBTV has been completed and comprises 8002 base pairs. The sequence also gives a complete restriction endonuclease map and the subcloning involved provides an extensive collection of clones of the viral DNA.

Clones and subclones of RBTV have been tested for their use in detecting virus in dot blots of crude sap from infected and healthy rice. Clones and subclones of RTBV will detect RBTV infections of rice but there is a minor problem of a a slight response from healthy rice. This will hopefully be overcome by using different subclones as probes.

R4D Indonesia

Professional assistance during birth and maternal mortality in two Indonesian districts

Confidential inquiries into maternal deaths: Modifications and adaptations in Ghana and Indonesia

Development Research Centre for the Future State (Research Scheme R8490) Annual Report 1 July 2008  30 June 2009

Overview of Qualitative Risk Assessments for the Introduction and Spread of HPAI H5N1 Virus

Mapping the Likelihood of Introduction and Spread of Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza Virus H5N1 in Africa and Indonesia using Multicriteria Decision Modelling

Pro-Poor HPAI Risk Reduction Strategies: Synthesis of Country Background Papers

Knowledge and Practices of Indonesian Rural Communities and Poultry Farmers Toward Avian Flu.

A Contingent Valuation Study on Indonesian Farmers Willingness to Accept Compensation for Poultry

WEMC Annual Report. 1 July 2008  30 June 2009

Appedices to Final Technical Report. Epidemiology and population structure of Phytophthora species causing diseases of coconut in Indonesia.

The nature, extent and eradication of homelessness in developing countries

Responses to avian influenza in Cambodia, Vietnam, Thailand and Indonesia

Going to Scale: The Potential of Community-led Total Sanitation

Tropical forests in poverty alleviation: from household data to global-comparative analysis

Do taxes help make better governments?

Financing primary health care

Centre for the Future State - Phase 2

Inequality, Human Security and Ethnicity Research Centre DRC (CRISE)

Women's Empowerment in Muslim Contexts (WEMC)

Initiative for Maternal Mortality Programme Assessment (IMMPACT)

Pro-Poor Policy Options to Control Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza (HPAI) in Africa and South East Asia

International review of bacterial wilt caused by Pseudomonas solanacearum

Variation in rice tungro viruses

Development Research Centre for the Future State (Research Scheme R8490) Annual Report 1 July 2008 30 June 2009

A Contingent Valuation Study on Indonesian Farmers Willingness to Accept Compensation for Poultry

WEMC Annual Report. 1 July 2008 30 June 2009