A study of the reasons for success or failure of soil conservation projects [antikvár]

SUMMARY PROJECT BACKGROUND In 1985 and 1986 FAO undertook the important study "African Agriculture: the next 25 years". During the study soil conservation projects in Africa were examined to see why some have been more successful than others. The results were interesting so a more detailed study was undertaken. The findings of this detailed study are given in this publication. The first plan was to select a few representative projects and study them in detail. However it soon became clear that projects vary so much that a small sample could not be representative. The plan was therefore changed to a less detailed study of a much larger sample. It also became apparent that there is a large amount of literature on assessments which has been carried out by other agencies, and although none of these were specifically addressed to soil conservation projects, their data and conclusions would still be very relevant to this project. METHOD The plan of work was to study all the available books, reports, assessment studies and project evaluations, and from this database to form some tentative conclusions. At the same time a fairly detailed evaluation was made of a sample of 40 projects which had a significant soil conservation component. A four-page assessment report was completed for each project, divided into sections relating to: planning and preparation before the project starts; implementation during the project; and assessment and continuity after completion of the project. The projects covered all types of agency: multilateral, bilateral, and NGC, and geographically were spread worldwide. The simple six-point evaluation method used in the FAO Review of Field Programmes was also applied to all assessed projects. CONCLUSIONS - BEFORE PROJECT IMPLEMENTATION By far the most significant conclusion from the study is the importance of project design. Every major assessment reaches the same conclusion, for example the World Bank study of almost 1000 projects over a ten-year period found that of projects which had poor performance, 86 percent had design faults, that is the problems were designed into the projects. In one third of these cases poor design was the most important single factor leading to poor performance. Design errors are mainly the result of incorrect assumptions made at the design stage. The main donor errors are: over-optimism, including over-estimating the effect of new practices; over-estimating the rate of adoption of new practices; over-estimation of the ability of the host country to provide backup facilities;