Community is the best focus for development ... this is where people live
and where quality of life matters. Community centric metrics show how
effectively resources are being used, not only those from external
sources, but also local resources.
Focus on Community
Community is probably the best organizational structure to facilitate
development. It is more effective than a single person, and has a scale that is
perhaps optimum ofr progress. Resources that are available can be used in the
best possible way. How can resources be used for best results? What incremental
resources are needed and where are they going to come from. How to ensure
that the community gets to use resources for its priority works. How are
community resources going to be used to achieve maximum economic value
adding and progress towards the goal of success in development. Is community
the key to success? Local people often know what they need, but don't have all
the resources to do what needs to be done.
Community centric development
This chapter puts community at the center of development. The community is
close to people who need to be the ultimate beneficiaries, and the definers of
priorities, as well as the funders of development, the implementers, the
managers, and the decision makers. A community makes it possible for people
to be in every facet of the development process.
It expands on the ideas that when people have opportunity they can make better
use of their abilities for good benefit. But it also recognizes that people are only
as good as the team they are part of. So it takes up the question of how people
can be organized to get things done. And how people need to be motivated for
success. It addresses how to organize for success at every level, while keeping
the priorities of people, and the enthusiasm of people so often lost in the
humdrum of a typical large organization. It takes up the importance of having
people well informed so that they are able to participate in priority setting and
decision making and making accountability a factor in development
performance.
Community Is For Ever
People live somewhere. That somewhere is the community. The place where
one lives, where one has been born, where the ancestors are buried has a unique
character in human history. While it is not anymore in the forefront of thinking
in the “north” it is still very important in the “south”.
One of the questions asked in accounting exams is to identify the reasons for
adopting the corporate form of organization. One of the reasons is that the
corporation has perpetual existence. But it is not as permanent as a geographic
community.
Maps that are hundreds of years old, in fact thousands of years old make
reference to the same communities that exist today. And historians ask what it is
that has changed over the years. My home town in the UK is a good example.
When I was growing up it had a population of around 4,000 ... 50 years before it
had had a population of around 3,800 ... and 900 years before the community
was written up in the Domesday Book compiled by William the Conqueror
shortly after 1066. Places really do have a continuity that can be used to track
progress.
And if we apply the same thinking to places in Iraq we go back to Biblical times.
Each and every community has a past, and this can be used to support a positive
future.
Development
People centric development holds the hope that development will result in
people being both the source of development energy and ideas and as well the
beneficiaries.
Development is about people. It always has been. But along the way the idea of
process, and a whole set of thematic issues has overtaken the people focus of
development.
For development to succeed it has to get back to people. Everyone who has
worked at the “grassroots” level of development understands the importance of
this. They know that failed development ends up with people who are poor and
hungry and lack the basics for a decent quality of life and with little or no
opportunity.
Modern development needs to move from a paradigm where the NORTH funds
the SOUTH and the SOUTH does what it is told, to an era where the people of
the SOUTH set the priorities in everything that affects them. The organizational
model for development where decision makers are “on top” and the
beneficiaries are on the bottom has to change.
The change has to happen not only at the level of the UN and the World Bank
and the donor organizations, but also at the level of the developing country or
beneficiary governments and other intermediary organizations.
Changing the culture of academic, corporate, government and political
leadership is not going to be an easy thing, but it is vital.
Paying Attention to the Past
At one time I worked with Winston Prattley, one of the elder statesmen
of UNDP. He recounted that he had been a junior officer in Iraq in the
1950s working on an FAO/UNDP irrigation project. During this work
they discovered some archaeological remains, and suspended the project
so that the archaeologists could study what had been found. It turned
out to be the remains of an old irrigation project ... that apparently had
fallen into disuse because of salinity some several thousand years before.
What goes around ... comes around. Salinity remains a problem with
irrigation in the present day.
Community Centric Planning
Planning with a community focus
A community focus results in a very different dynamic for development than
what has prevailed in the past. When planning is community centric, the
priorities are much more likely to be of socio-economic value to the community.
Plans that originate in the community have the possibility of “ownership” by the
community, and there is a strong correlation between what is priority and what
is done. Plans with community focus can be simple and understandable, and at
the same time can be totally suitable for the community. Small is efficient and
allows for the optimization of plans within a community without the
compromise inherent in super-scale projects intended to satisfy everyone, and
ending up satisfying no-one.
Gosplan does not work
Central planning ... Gosplan, as it was known in the Soviet Union ... is a system
that makes decisions and allocates resources based on what the government
thinks. A community focus for planning puts the community first, and it is the
community that drives the allocation of resources and the priorities for socioeconomic development.
In Iraq since the fall of Baghdad, most relief and development resources have
been sourced and controlled within government ... and mainly the within the US
government and its military. All the planning is essentially at a high level with
little input from the communities where people live.
Community goal - quality of life
Quality of life is something that is determined as much as anything by what
goes on in our own community. What goes on at any distance from my
community may be interesting, and may have an indirect impact, but is nowhere
near as important as what goes on in my community.
And within the community, my family is the most important. To the extent that
people are interested in far away places, it is often because a family member is
there.
What is quality of life is very subjective ... it is what an individual and the family
wants.
Components of community planning
The components of community centric planning are the same as for any other
planning. That is:
- Get facts;
- Analyze and optimize;
- Organize;
- Implement;
- Measure;
- Feedback; and,
- Analyze and adjust.
People in the community may not be well educated or academic. Most will not
speak an international language. Some who know the most may not be literate,
but that does not mean they do not know their community. In practical terms,
they will know a lot more about the facts of their community than outsiders.
They may have plans to make things better but not the resources, and they may
have a rather limited appreciation of what is truly possible.
By making community the focal point of development, organizations in the
community can benefit from assistance in ways that translate into tangible help
for people and value adding for the community.
Types of resources
The critical resources for development are people, physical resources such as
materials and equipment and infrastructure, financial resources and knowhow.
The performance of development depends on how these resources are
organized and used. The information and management dimension of
development facilitates effective organization. This section deals with
mobilizing enough of these resources.
People
People are the first critical resource. There are a lot of people in developing
countries, and most are poor and many are hungry. Sadly, many are also
uneducated and untrained and therefore ill-equipped to handle modern jobs.
This is the community that should benefit from development excellence, but it
will not show so much in this generation but in the next.
For someone of my age it is possible to think in generational terms because there
have been very profound changes in the human condition over the past fifty
years. While the truly poor have not progressed, the number of people in
developing countries with education, and some of it very good eduction, is very
large now compared to (say) two generations ago. The experience of the older
people in this group is also substantial. The critical key element that is missing is
opportunity so that this group can be the agents for development progress.
All initiatives in development in order to have the essential sustainable
economic value adding characteristic must involve local people as an integral
part of the initiative.
In the analytical framework that become feasible with a good development
information system, the economic value adding analysis incorporates a people
dimension so that human factors and quality of life are taken into consideration
Organizational infrastructure
People can have more power when they are organized in some way. There are a
variety of organizational forms, all of which have some history that defines them
and ways of operating that gives them strength.
Physical infrastructure
In most of the SOUTH the physical infrastructure is poor and dilapidated. It
should be possible for the abundance of labor and natural resources to be used
in an effective way to facilitate the upgrading of the infrastructure.
Natural resources
In most of the SOUTH the physical infrastructure is poor and dilapidated. It
should be possible for the abundance of labor and natural resources to be used
in an effective way to facilitate the upgrading of the infrastructure.
Materials and production equipment
Some physical resources are available in developing countries and some are not.
There are many types of natural resources in developing countries while there is
a shortage of business materials and equipment and the physical infrastructure
is poor and dilapidated. It should be possible for the abundance of natural
resources to be used in an effective way to facilitate the upgrading of business
materials and equipment and the upgrading of the infrastructure.
There are big questions about the manner in which natural resources are used in
support of development. The history of natural resource exploitation is that local
communities have suffered while outsiders have benefited. The history of
exploitative behavior was supposed to end with the end of empire, but the last
fifty years suggests that there are other factors at play that go beyond the issues
of European colonialism.
There are enough valuable resources in developing countries, and enough
business material and equipment available around th world for this not to be a
constraint on development.
In the analytical framework for economic value adding, most large scale export
oriented foreign financed resource exploitation projects have a low performance
rating in terms of economic value adding for the host community and host
country. This should not be and need not be.
On the other hand these local resources should be developed so that they serve
to create and support sustainable development and economic progress.
Financial resources
Africa and the SOUTH needs investors that are looking for a high return on a
small investment, and want their investment to be earning well for a long time.
Africa and the SOUTH needs to get away from the international investors that
are looking for a big return on a big investment and an early and easy exit
strategy.
And there are enough financial resources in the modern world to finance
anything that is low risk and economic value adding. The challenge is to create
financing vehicles and the financial intermediaries that will make it possible for
the capital markets to operate for the benefit of their investors and development
at the same time.
Information is Valuable
It was said of the Rothschild Bank in the Victorian era that they had the
best information in the financial community, and that this was the
secret of their success.
It is still true in modern times that information is
key to financial performance. It can be manipulated information that
created wealth and scandal in recent years in the financial community,
or it can be the reliable sound basic financial information being proposed
in this work to support development investment
Financial resources are available in both the institutional capital market and
among private investors and philanthropic organizations. The challenge is to
organize so that these sources see a good return and a low risk from investing in
development and the economic value adding of developing communities.
Know-how
And there is also enough technical know how for development success to be
achieved anywhere modern people with resources choose to work. Good
management of limited development resources will not encourage do anything
anywhere development, but will aim to focus the use of development resources
where there can be the most economic value adding, and the most benefit to the
host community and the local people.
Africa and developing countries need technical support as well as investment. In
most cases it is preferable to have investment and technical support to be from
different sources
Importance of Trust
Nothing works very well unless there is of trust. Trust is about knowing people
and respecting people. It is an ethical or moral concept more than it is a legal
construct. Trust facilitates progress in a very important way.
Most poor, small or remote communities do not have an incorporated structure
and any global visibility that is “trustable” by the “north” ... and in due time this
has to be addressed. But a lot can be done when trust is established with a
community, initially on a personal level, and then on a bigger level.
Though it may not be possible to get major external funding assistance into a
community without a formal legal structure of “trust”, a lot can be done with a
combination of information, organization and personal relationships.
Framework for Community Metrics
Corporate financial reports
The corporate model for financial reporting is well understood. It is (1) the
balance sheet; (2) the profit and loss account; (3) the cash flow statement; and (4)
any explanatory notes and supporting schedules.
TVM community reports
The TVM community reports comprise a report on the State of the Community
and a report on the Productivity of the Community. These reports are analogous
to the Balance Sheet and the Profit and Loss Account in the corporate setting.
State of Community
As in a financial balance sheet, the CA State of the Community is based on the
assets of the community, that is, their value, and the liabilities of the
community ... the constraints and what it is that stops the community from being
better than it is ... the negative value that this represents.
Assets ... resources
Resources are not just money and financial resources. They also include human
and natural resources which are often abundant and valuable when used well.
- People. What is the human potential? What is needed so that people can do the maximum that they are capable of?
- Natural resources. What natural resources are there? How can local resources be used as an economic driver for the area? What is the natural economic potential of the area? What can agriculture do? Are their other local resources that have economic potential?
- Organization. What are the capabilities of existing organizations? What is needed so that they can do the maximum that they can do? What professional organizations are there and what can they do?
- Infrastructure. What is there? What is the best way to improve the infrastructure so that it can support the highest level of activity? What is the status of the roads, the communications, the clinics and hospitals, the transport systems, etc, etc?
- Production capability. What production capacity is there? Does business have what is needed?
- Working capital. Does business have access to the working capital and liquidity it needs. What needs to be done to satisfy working capital needs?
- Money. What money and financial services are available? How can salaries and suppliers be paid? What is the business model to generate positive cash flow? What are revenues? Is it market driven? Is it government budget? Is it grant based? Is it fee based? Is it mixed?
- Knowledge. What knowledge is there? Is everything known that needs to be known. How to stay up to date. How to train new people. How to update knowledge and be in the global knowledge community.
Liabilities ... Constraints
What might be possible?
It is not easy to identify what might be possible ... but this is the value that must
be ascertained about any community.
For any enterprise to be profitable in any specific situation the basic cost
structure must be favorable relative to the market situation ... price and demand.
This will reflect the enabling environment in its most broad interpretation.
A lot depends on the ability of an entrepreneur to take on a challenge and go
into business in competition with other locals and with the world.
EXPAND
There might be possibilities in the agro-production area using processing animal
products ... processed meats and skins.
There might be possibilities in the petro-chemical area using the feedstocks that
are available from the oil and gas sector. This could be very big business and
profitable if done in cooperation with organizations that have access or control
international markets.
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