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PATH’s delivery kit

Delivery kits are simple kits containing essential items for ensuring the clean delivery of babies, either at home or in health clinics. They contain easy-to-use items recommended by WHO (World Health Organisation). These include:

  • soap for hand washing
  • three pieces of string for tying the cord
  • one new stainless steel blade for cutting the umbilical cord
  • one plastic sheet to use as a clean delivery surface
  • diagrams showing how to use contents. Other items can also be added such as:
  • eyedropper
  • torch.

Kits are produced in a number of countries, including Malawi and Nepal. PATH has just produced a step-by-step guide for organisations interested in developing a locally based delivery kit programme. This approach can be used in any country setting. Copies of the manual are available free of charge from:

PATH, 4 Nickerson Street, Seattle, WA 98109-1699, USA.
E-mail: apallat@path.org Website: www.path.org

A sample delivery kit for organisations interested in producing these can be obtained from:

MCHP, Anamnagar, PO Box 7136, Kathmandu.
E-mail: mch@ecomail.com.np Website: www.mchp.org.np

Impact assessment for development agencies by Chris Roche

This is a detailed and complex study, which argues the need for impact assessment to take place throughout the development process, and to be concerned with lasting change. Ten case studies help illustrate all kinds of issues concerning impact assessment. The book has 308 pages, and is available from Oxfam (address below).

A Basic Guide to Evaluation for Development Workers
by Frances Rubin

This is a short book outlining the basic practical issues around evaluation and a useful guide through the whole process. It is aimed at NGOs and written simply and clearly. It has 96 pages available from Oxfam.

Further information on the above two books and the cost of postage can be obtained from:

Oxfam, c/o BEBC Distribution, PO Box 1496, Parkstone, Dorset, BH12 3YD, UK. E-mail: oxfam@bebc.co.uk.
Website: www.oxfam.org.uk

Participatory Impact Monitoring by Dorsi Germann, Eberhard Gohl and Burkhard Schwarz

This is an excellent, well illustrated series of four booklets designed to help people in self-help projects improve their impact. The purpose of Participatory Impact Monitoring, or PIM, is to help groups involve their members in observation, reflection and decision making and to strengthen the group and ensure their activities meet the needs of group members. The booklets are full of practical ideas to encourage participatory learning.

Booklet 1 introduces the concepts, establishing indicators and recording information within groups.

Booklet 2 extends the concepts to organisations.

Booklet 3 contains a number of field studies from around the world describing their use of PIM and the outcomes.

Booklet 4 looks at the various steps for using PIM during the project cycle.

The PIM concept was developed by several organisations. The set of four booklets is available in English, with booklets 1 and 2 also available in French, Spanish and Portuguese. The booklets are out of print but can be downloaded free of charge from the website below. Click on publications and then economics/management and monitoring.

GATE, PO Box 5180, D-65726 Eschborn, Germany.
Website: www3.gtz.de/gate

For queries about PIM, FAKT can be consulted…
E-mail:fakt@fakt-consult.de

HIV/AIDS – World Concern

World Concern, Myanmar, has developed a series of three sessions on the subject of HIV/AIDS to use in raising awareness and response among participants. Each session takes up to two hours. The first uses simple quizzes to explore people’s perceptions of HIV and AIDS. The second session uses a video to increase understanding of the issues real people face with HIV/AIDS infection and to consider how people should respond. The third session uses an open ended story of how a family responds to HIV/AIDS infection. Though based on Myanmar, these sessions would be of value in any situation and the explanatory notes are available free of charge from:

World Concern, Myanmar, 37/1 Phetburi Soi 15, Bangkok 10400, Thailand. E-mail: wc@mptmail.net.mm

The video in English is available from:

Mr Chris Lowenstein, Producer, Living Films, PO Box 241, Chiang Mai 5000, Thailand. E-mail: chris@livingfilms.com

Copies of the video are also available in Burmese and Jinghpaw from World Concern, together with the original English transcripts for organisations wishing to translate this into other languages.

Partners in Evaluation by MT Feuerstein

A simple and practical guide to evaluation, packed full of good ideas and illustrations. Just as relevant now as when it was first written 15 years ago. The book has 196 pages and is available from:

TALC, PO Box 49, St Albans, Herts, AL1 5TX, UK
E-mail: talc@talcuk.org

Six outils pour construire des partenariats durables

(Six tools for building sustainable partnerships)

This pack of six small booklets (42 pages in all) is designed to help grassroots organisations prepare for a programme with a partner. Each booklet is designed for group discussion. Different points of view from grassroots leaders are included to stimulate the group’s own opinions and conclusions. This helps build up confidence and ability to form strong partnerships. The booklets include titles such as Knowing Ourselves, Knowing a Partner and Carrying out a Project and Building Confidence.

The pack costs 6,000  FCFA to readers in Africa and is available from: GRAD, 228 Rue du Manet, 74130 Bonneville, France
E-mail: grad.fr@fnac.net

GRAD works with NGOs and farmers’ organisations in Africa and also has a catalogue with many other resources that may be of interest to readers.
 
Better food please! 

In Sao Paulo – SP, Brazil, recent studies organised by the government revealed there were about 9,000 homeless people in the city. Most are men who sometimes earn a little money from sorting rubbish. Almost half lack any type of official papers. Though the majority of homeless people are younger, the studies found that one fifth were above 50 years of age.

 

The ‘Sitio das Alamedas’ is a pilot project established by the Department for Social Services of São Paulo. It serves as a temporary home for 40 elderly homeless people. The objective is to build their confidence and sense of belonging and then encourage them to return back into society.

 

The residents themselves decide on the rules for the functioning of the house and share work on a rota system for household tasks such as cooking and cleaning. A participatory study took place in order to identify difficulties concerning cooking in particular. The main difficulties noted by the residents were:

 

  • Problems with relationships
  • Lack of organisation
  • Little knowledge of cooking skills
  • Waste of water and food
  • Risk of accidents particularly due to alcoholism
  • Lack of hygiene.

Another meeting then took place with the residents to work out some suggestions together to solve these problems and encourage good cooking practice. These included:

 

  • Improving diets by reducing the quantity of salt, sugar and cooking oil used
  • Donating left-over food to the slum at the end of each day
  • Organising regular meetings to help organise the work
  • More supervision from the cook for teams experiencing difficulties
  • Teaching on personal hygiene and food hygiene
  • Providing aprons and caps to keep hair up.
  • To avoid accidents it was suggested that:
  • No one who had drunk alcohol should enter the kitchen
  • People should give greater concentration to their work in the kitchen
  • Long trousers, closed shoes and aprons should be worn
  • Broken equipment should be quickly replaced or repaired.

These suggestions were used as a basis to produce two illustrated booklets on cooking. The first, with helpful advice on improving organisation, used ‘comic strip’ stories and showed characters drawn from the elderly residents themselves. The second discussed personal hygiene and food hygiene, and included learning activities such as word searches, jokes and crosswords. The booklets were used in workshops with the residents.

 

The residents were very happy about their improved knowledge of cooking. Lessons were quickly learnt and put into practice. Regular weekly meetings with each cooking team helped in the organisation of the work. Through working together to identify and solve problems and difficulties, people felt valued and strengthened. There was a considerable improvement in relationships and many improvements in hygiene, diet and cooking standards.

 

Contributed by Paulo Sérgio Stockler, a public health educator and post graduate student at the University of São Paulo. His address is Rua Capão da Serra 51, Jardim da Saúde, São Paulo – SP Brazil, CEP: 04289 090. E-mail: paser28@ig.com.br

 

Copies of the two booklets in Portuguese are available from Paulo for readers in Latin America. For readers elsewhere, please write to Resources Office, PO Box 200, Bridgnorth, WV16 4WQ, UK.

This page was last updated on 07 June 2005