Livelihoods Approaches to Information and Communication in Support of Rural Poverty Elimination and Food Security

This publication provides a review of the theoretical background literature on sustainable livelihoods, with an emphasis on the "potential of livelihoods approaches to improve the impact of information and communication initiatives in developing countries." It is produced as the first phase of a collaborative research project by the Overseas Development Institute (ODI), the UK Department for International Development (DFID) and the United Nations Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO).

The aim of this report is to "bring together livelihoods thinking with ideas from information and communication for development, in order to improve understanding of the role and importance of information and communication in support of rural livelihoods." It provides a review of the sustainable livelihoods (SL) literature; an assessment of the information needs in different sectors; an overview of existing systems; and suggestions for how new initiatives can build upon and enhance those existing structures in order to take advantage of the "strengths and opportunities" already available in the community.

The report concludes with a series of policy recommendations, including:

• Building on existing systems, while encouraging integration of different technologies and information sharing
• Determining who should pay, through consensus and based on a thorough analysis of the costs
• Ensuring equitable access to marginalised groups and those in the agricultural sector
• Promoting localised content, with decentralised and locally owned processes
• Building capacity, through provision of training packages and maintaining a choice of information sources
• Using realistic technologies, that are suitable within the existing infrastructure
• Building knowledge partnerships to ensure that knowledge gaps are filled and a two-way flow of information allows knowledge to originate from all levels of the network and community

Contents:

1. Introduction
   
2. Sustainable Livelihoods and the Role of Information and Communication
• Sustainable livelihoods approaches
• Information and communication in the context of SL
  
3. Better Information for Better Decisions
• Information for farmers, institutions, governments and donors
• Strategic importance of information
  
4. Existing Information Systems for Rural Livelihoods
• Importance of existing systems
• Information costs
• Access, empowerment and democratisation
• Appropriate content and context
  
5. Building on Existing Systems
• Building capacity of existing systems
• Realistic technological approaches
• Strengthening partnerships
  
6. Conclusion and Policy Recommendations
• Conclusions
• Recommendations for policy action

    References
    Appendix 1: Document Summaries