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Community-Life School Model for Sustainable Agriculture Based Rural Development

Rural poverty continues to persist in spite of numerous rural -based programs and projects implemented over the years.   Despite development initiatives from the government, non government and private organizations to alleviate rural poverty, illiteracy and malnutrition remain high in rural areas.  During the 1980’s, the search for new development models have led rural development workers and theorists to advocate for participatory development models (Chambers, 1998) as an alternative to the top down model of development.  Although the participatory paradigm proved successful in terms of accomplishing project objectives, the problem of sustaining the gains of the intervention after the pull out of the project remains a major challenge.

This paper presents insights on three rural-based projects namely the rice-based project implemented in 95 ARC municipalities which focused on enhancing farm productivity through rice, vegetables and livestock production, the education intervention with the Tagbanuas in Caluait, Palawan and the on-going rice based project in Padre Burgos, Quezon.

The first project reveals increases in the number of farmers with those having yields of 4 MT/hectare and above from only 41.5% to 65% of 200 farmer participants. However, for the project to have impact on rural community conditions, local organizations should be strengthened to ensure widening of gains to other members of the community at the same time that it has to develop skills in marketing farmer produce. Networking with other organizations through project implementation was part of the strategy to build on social capital. The current rice productivity enhancement project in Padre Burgos integrates the important strategies and insights in the first two projects and expands the network and concerns beyond the farm to include education concerns for elementary and out-of- school youth.

Given the variations of rural community needs, the implementation framework starts with a rapid needs and opportunity analysis after which an entry point project is determined. With the thrust for ensuring a sustainable livelihood, the framework emphasizes a participatory, experiential approach in co-developing technologies in livelihood activities appropriate to the needs and conditions of the rural community. However, livelihood may not necessarily be the entry point. In Calauit, Palawan for example, the entry point was education since that the community did not have an elementary school at that time. It eventually expanded to cover farming and fishing intervention and now, the proposed agro-eco cultural tourism project.

The Community-Life School (CLS) Model highlights volunteerism, life-long learning, enhancement of social capital and endogenous led development as pillars of sustained development. The CLS model believes that empowered individuals and households are key to sustained rural development. Moreover, it advocates tackling development in a holistic manner by involving all members of the households and key stakeholders in addressing aspects on livelihood, education, environment, nutrition and governance.The community life school hopes to contribute to the struggle of the rural communities for a vibrant and productive rural life.

Seminar 14 Slides
Seminar 14 Discussion Paper
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