Newsletter for MS-Tanzania

For MS partners and development workers in Tanzania.

September 2003

Editor: Information worker Michael Bech
Editor-in-chief: Director Finn Petersen

 

Mounting pressure

It has been a tough start after the holidays in the secretariat in MS-Denmark. And we will feel some of the aftershocks too ‘down here in the South’. You all know that the Danish government is making another cut in international aid. And MS will suffer together with other large NGO’s.

MS-Denmark has been revising budgets, are reorganizing and will be reducing staff. Nine persons will be asked to leave MS-Denmark. The IT-section will disappear, some of the positions for training DW’s will be cut and the MS-Revy will be closed.

The reorganization will result in the information department being abolished. Instead three persons are grouped under the secretary general in order to strengthen external communication. And the remaining people from the information department will be attached to other departments to put more focus on the lack of visibility in our organization. ‘Consolidation’ is the key-word in the restructuring of MS – there will be no space for new people making policies or developing new programmes.

The draft synthesis report of the evaluation was finalized in July, and MS has already commented on the positive and negative findings in the report.

Head of International Department, Lars Engberg-Petersen, comments that it is possible to find what you look for in the report – whether you want to support or criticize MS:

"My impression is that we have certainly not received top grades, but on the other hand I also find the assessment somewhat superficial. This is a pity because it makes it more complicated to use the evaluation as a basis for changing MS’ policies and practices," says Lars Engberg-Petersen in the newsletter from the international department.

MS’ personnel assistance is being heavily criticized. This activity seems to be sacred to Danida no more and some influential persons in Denmark also feel that personnel support is outdated. So the very core activity and central part of MS’ identity is under pressure.

News from the director

There will be no news from the director this time, as Finn Petersen is in Denmark for 14 days attending the management meeting in MS.

Roadshow in Mwanza

Now the North is able to create visibility about their fine work in the media. The Roadshow ‘Mwandishi wa Habari’ was passing Mwanza in mid-August. And 13 participants from the partnerships in the North were attending the workshop on media, writing skills and ways of contacting the press. Three articles from the participants will be published late September in the coming issue of ‘Habari za Tanzania’.

Out and around at CO

We have got a new smiling face at the country office. Her name is Joan Lohay, and she is the new programme officer from 1st September. Being the third PO, Joan will take over the responsibility for the partnerships of Dogodogo, TRC-Mugumu, TAMWA, TGNP and WAMATA (together with Finn Petersen). Her primary geographical areas will be Kisarawe and Mukuranga. The changes are not going to happen overnight – there will be a period of phasing out the ‘old’ PO and phasing in the new one.

31 year old Joan Lohay has previously been working for Tanzania Food & Nutrition Centre as a programme officer for nutrition education.

Book review

We are all well aware of the political situation in Denmark; it is more important than ever that we are able to show the results of our work in the developing world. But how do we do that?

Development worker Claus Lyngby Petersen - Agricultural Advisor for UVIMTA-Mdandu – has a recommendation for you all:

I have just received a very exciting handbook from Japan; ‘Impact Evaluation of Development Assistance – a Practical Handbook for Designing Methodologically Sound Impact Evaluations under Budget, Time, and Data Constraints’ written by Michael Bamberger and Nobuko Fujita.

The 132 pages book which was released last month has been written for the Japanese NGO, ‘Foundation for Advanced Studies on International Development’ (FASID), who will use it for evaluation of their projects in the future. Michael Bamberger knows what he is talking about. He has worked for several years with evaluation programs for The World Bank. This book though is specially designed for NGO’s and people working within NGO-programs.

It consists of three parts. The first part is the ‘Introduction to Impact Evaluations’ with two chapters concerning ‘opportunities and challenges’ and ‘an introduction to the theory and practice of impact evaluation design’. The second part is about the term ‘the shoestring evaluation approach’. This part has three chapters: ‘Reducing the costs and time required to conduct impact evaluations’, ‘reconstructing baseline data and control groups’ and ‘identifying and addressing threats to validity’. The third part of the book is about how to use the shoestring evaluation on different levels. The chapters go through ‘the project level’, ‘sector and program level’ and ‘country and policy level’. This part of the book ends with a chapter about how to build in evaluation into project and program designs.

As the book is a practical handbook, the annexes consist of three different worksheets, which can be used as guidelines to evaluate: Individual projects, sector programs and country and policy programs. Furthermore the annexes give examples on how the worksheets are used in practice on some of the examples Bamberger uses throughout the book.

The book is somehow a technical book, and you have to be a little bit into evaluation terms in order to benefit from it. Though, it is my belief that participants in MS-Tanzania Country Program (DW’s, country office and partners) will be able to get brilliant ideas on how to plan and document their achievements if they go through the book.

Therefore I will offer people with special interests to contact me for further information on the book – possibly before 7th September in order to bring you more information at the Zonal meeting - on mc@atma.co.tz or on landline 026 278 2728.

News from UVIMTA-Mdandu

The paprika farmers in UVIMTA-Mdandu are now depending on the exchange rate on € (Euro) due to their sale of the red spice to Tanzania Spices Ltd. in Iringa. The farmers who started as contract farmers have been upgraded to commercial farmers on the two plots and due to this they are now paid in €. So far they have managed to sell 3.333 kg of paprika to the World market. The sale has until now given 20 paprika farmers a gross value of 3,2 million Shillings. The farmers have received 150.000 TSH in a grant from MS to cover costs for the first sale. This money is now transformed into a ‘revolving transport fund’ as each farmer pays according to the amount of kilos he or she is selling. In that way the money for transport will always be available for the project and not a constraint for the individual farmers. Even though there is no complete cost-benefit analysis on the project, the farmers believe so strongly in this new crop, that the project will expand from the current pilot project with 30 acres this year to 110 acres next year both as a rain fed crop and as an irrigated crop.

Two trainings in leadership and management have been conducted for the members of UVIMTA and UVIM’s in Mdandu. The first 5 day training had 16 participants - all were members of the UVIMTA committee. Second training was also for 5 days, it had 20 participants, and they were the chairpersons and one member from each of the 10 UVIM’s.

UVIMTA is preparing their members and getting ready to manage their NGO to go into partnership on new conditions with MS-Tanzania in the beginning of 2004. And they are making progress with an increasing number of meetings, solving conflicts within member organisations and developing procedures for the daily management of UVIMTA. All this and much more are going on every day in the Mdandu villages, thus the capacities developed and activities carried out will definitely contribute to sustainability of the organisation.

Training centre opens

The Dogodogo Centre for street children in Dar es Salaam is opening a multipurpose training centre. The official opening is 5th September where the guest of honour is the Minister for Community Development, Gender and Children, Dr. Asha-Rose Migiro.

The day will be filled with festivities conducted by the children of Dogodogo Centre and children from other street children centres in Dar es Salaam.

Contact for the Newsletter: michael_bech@net.dialog.dk - mobile 0744 - 87 40 80