Description of Project - Development Through Radio (DTR) Radio Listening Clubs, Zambia: Impact Evaluation Report

This DTR project ran from November 1998 until May 2001, a partnership between Panos, ZNBC Bemba service and a group of thirteen previously-existing rural women's clubs. The clubs meet weekly to listen to the radio programmes and discuss development issues. They make tape recordings of their discussions, and these are sent to a radio producer in Lusaka who listens to them and approaches a relevant official donor or expert for a response to the issues raised by the club – information and, if possible, commitment to practical intervention. The tape and response are edited together to make a radio programme which is broadcast weekly on the national broadcaster (ZNBC Bemba language service) for the clubs to listen to and discuss, and at a time that also apeals to a general audience. The producer is also responsible for following up with respondents and clubs to ensure that commitments are fulfilled and clubs take whatever steps are needed to access the promised resources.

The thirteen women's clubs are in villages along a main road, 600 km north of Lusaka alongside the Lusaka to Dar es Salaam railway. The villages at the ends of the project area are 60 km apart from each other along the main road, while others are up to 10-15 km off the road on either side, accessible only by dirt road (and in one case, accessible only by a footpath). Two of the communities are the compounds of employees of a quarry and an oil pipeline, while the others are more truly rural villages living mainly from agriculture, There are two health centres and number of schools in the area, but the nearest hospital is 70 km away. The nearest town and administrative centre, Mpika, is 108 km distant. There is a bus service, but access to markets and sources of agricultural inputs is a major problem for the communities.