Digital Pulse - Ch 2 - Sec 3 - Participatory Rural Communication Appraisal (PRCA)

Summary

This article provides details on a communications research approach developed at the SADC Regional Centre of Communication for Development based in Harare, Zimbabwe, during the mid 1990's. This approach, called Participatory Rural Community Appraisal (PRCA) is a research methodology designed to involve rural people in, “the identification of the essential elements for the design of effective communication strategies and programmes for development.” This approach is intended to improve dialogue between rural peoples and local development officials through the use of various visualisation techniques, interviews, and participatory group work. This article argues for the expanded use of PRCA and takes the position that it is a superior model for determining the needs of rural peoples and the ideal solutions to the challenges that they face.

Key Points

The PRCA model was developed to guarantee that development communication programmes are in touch with the realities of the rural community being targeted. The authors suggest that a “conspiracy of courtesy” exists wherein local peoples often conceal their true feelings and information from development workers and other outsiders. PRCA was designed to overcome this by fully involving the community in the information generating process and drawing the sum of their knowledge and desires into the light. PRCA is a synthesis of other participatory research methods (RRA: Rapid Rural Appraisal; PRA: Participatory Rural Appraisal; PLA: Participatory Learning & Action) as well as more traditional communication approaches. The following features set PRCA apart from other approaches.

• Holistic – Researches both community needs, opportunities, and problems as well as communication issues, networks, and systems. This inclusive nature differentiates it from other participatory approaches that do not directly address communication issues.
• Participatory – The role of the researcher is to facilitate the investigation and analysis of the community's problems by the community itself, rather than to extract information and conduct analysis elsewhere as typified by traditional communication approaches.
• Empowering – PRCA provides training for community members and enables them to conduct their own assessments in the future.
• Results in joint planning of both development actions and communication programmes.
• Creates interactive groups on the basis of shared common problems and bridges communities differentiated by local values.
• Appraisal results are presented by the community rather than to the community and they retain ownership of the results.
• Emphasis on the use of visual methods for generating and analysing data, a technique designed to overcome wide variances in literacy throughout the community.
• Seeks to integrate the revealed local knowledge with that possessed by development workers to create more effective and appropriate solutions.

PRCA is a flexible tool that can be used to define the needs and priorities necessary to commence a development project and to correct those that have gone astray. It has been effectively implemented in a host of rural development projects throughout Africa through Action Programme workshops that aim to train middle-management staff in its methods. A training package on these methods has been published and is in circulation. Information on this approach is available at the SADC Regional Centre of Communication for Development.

Source:SDdimensions, July 1998