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CTR SAYS RURAL DEVELOPMENT A MATTER OF
JURGENCY AS IT LAUNCHES ITS RURAL BASKET INITIATIVE
November 2007
Zambia’s struggles with improving living conditions of the people are more evident in rural areas and call for unprecedented, holistic creative efforts in addressing them. For example, to attain household food security, a number of equally pressing issues ranging from infrastructure development, health and education, people’s attitudes, to development of sustainable livelihoods, etc., need to be simultaneously attended to with uniform levels of intensity, says the Jesuit Centre for Theological Reflection (JCTR) in the wake of the launch of the JCTR Rural Basket Initiative.
In proceeding with the Rural Basket, the JCTR took into serious consideration the unique conditions of rural areas, such as being by and large non-cash economy, based mainly on agriculture and whose inhabitants depend little on non-farm economic activities for income generation.
In addition, wide consultations on the concept of the Rural Basket were held with stakeholders followed by a rigorous pilot phase covering more that twelve months conducted in the three areas of Chief Malama’s area in Mambwe district, Matushi in Mufumbwe district and Saka in Masaiti District. The intention of the pilot -- which featured intensive interviews with select households on a monthly basis -- was to draw lessons aimed at improving the methodology, to understand consumption and food availability patterns through compilation of food calendar, to gather other qualitative socio-economic information on, for example, health, education, agriculture practices, infrastructure, among others.
The Rural Basket depicts various dimensions of the rural household situation, including prevailing food availability and household consumption in three rural areas across Zambia. It also highlights the cost of non-food essentials such as cost of soap, matches, milling, etc. This tool for assessing living conditions of the people in rural areas is primarily designed to raise the profile of rural areas to feature more prominently in policy designs and debates.
According to the JCTR, from pre-independence times up to the present time, Zambia’s approaches to development have weighed heavily in favour of urban areas. Yet it is in Zambia’s rural areas where the challenge of development is even more pronounced. As such the JCTR views this Rural Basket initiative as not only a matter of encouraging more adequate responses to rural challenges, but also a social justice imperative.
In carrying out research on the Rural Basket and the urban Basic Needs Basket -- both of which are oriented towards structural changes in society -- the JCTR takes strong cognisance of the challenge such research poses in actually ensuring that the people who have experienced and endured incessant studies and promises of development see tangible outcomes (e.g., having three meals per day) in the shortest time possible.
The need to see tangible outcomes of research and any other development intervention or pronouncement must also be seen and understood in a historical context where disheartening longstanding rural problems that have featured in various development policy documents or strategies over the years beginning in the early years of Zambia’s independence have not delivered significant changes in people’s lives.
For example in 1968, Zambia’s first President stated, among other development goals, that “nutritional aspects should be the third fundamental part of rural life by 1980 after adequate possibilities for earning a reasonable income and an adequate access to all levels of services. Everyone living in the rural areas, especially the children (should) have suitably balanced diets to meet the challenge of rural development.” (quoted from “Basic Needs in An Economy Under Pressure: Findings and Recommendations of an ILO/JASPA Basic Needs Mission to Zambia,” ILO, 1981).
Currently the Fifth National Development Plan (FNDP) talks in a similar way in terms of agriculture in its goal “to promote increased and sustainable agricultural production, productivity and competitiveness in order to ensure food security; income generation; creation of employment opportunities; and reduction in poverty levels.“
Given this situation of historical failure of rural development and the renewed energy expressed in the FNDP, it is timely and important to hold every stakeholder of rural development, in particular the government, accountable to its promise to bring development to rural areas. This process of holding government accountable will obviously benefit in significant ways from the JCTR Rural Basket as a tool for knowing the existing situation and measuring any progress being made.
According to the JCTR pilot results of September, all the three rural areas (Malama, Saka and Matushi) showed deficiencies of varying degrees in average calorie intake requirement of 2,400 per person per day. Malama recorded 1,400 calories from actual consumption of an average household of seven; Saka recorded it at 2,100 for an average household of five and Matushi at 800 for an average household of ten.
In this regard, the JCTR sees the Rural Basket as instrumental to achieving ultimate structural change, seen in terms of household’s ability to meet basic needs, necessary for the promotion of national development. In this effort and taking into account the need for holistic responses to rural challenges, the JCTR intends to share this information widely and promote responses from a wide range of stakeholders, including government, traditional governance structures, local and international civil society groups and others.
Even as it embarks on publishing the Rural Basket, the JCTR will continue publishing the urban Basket across towns of Lusaka, Livingstone, Kabwe, Ndola, Kitwe, Luanshya, Mongu and Kasama. The Lusaka Basket in November recorded continued increase in the price of food in the midst of declining inflation.
Brief Explanations on the Rural Basket
The Rural Basket is presented in five sections. Sections A, B, C, D and E (see attached). Sections A and B, respectively, present basic food Items and essential non-food items for a particular average household size. In addition, each of the two sections has two columns. The column on the left represents what people expressed could be the ideal foods available and desired for consumption in a particular season. This expressed ideal food availability and consumption was then subjected to nutritional analysis to establish amounts necessary for consumption for the recommended calories which averages 2,400 calories per person per day. The column on the right represents the food that was actually consumed on average in that particular month. The difference between the recommended calorie requirement in the first column and the actual calorie derived from the food that was consumed represents the level of “calorie deprivation”. Among other things, deprivation in calorie intake affects growth in children.
In the same vein of section A, section B has two columns, one depicting the kind and level of the required non-food items and the other what households are actually able to afford. Again, the difference between these columns represents the level of deprivation in relation to decent and healthy living conditions.
Section C is distinct from the first two sections of A and B in that it is one that gives a picture of social services of the select rural areas where the Rural Basket is being researched. The section highlights the situations of water, education, health, agricultural extension services, etc. Some notable situations as revealed during the pilot in these areas include an absence or inadequate health personnel, teachers, agricultural extension officers, poor road infrastructure, unjust crop marketing arrangements, etc
Section D is linked to section A in that it demonstrates the minimum level of agricultural production in order to achieve food security. It also highlights the required cultivation area and levels of inputs in a particular area for meeting food production (e.g., maize, cassava, beans, groundnuts, etc) necessary to achieve food security.
The last section, E, is about sources of livelihoods. As has already been observed, the main source of livelihood in the rural areas is agriculture. Only in a few instances do households engage in other non-agricultural based income generating activities such as beer brewing or earning a wage through some form of casual employment, e.g., thatching, game scout, etc.
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