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Published on 1 April 2010

Written by Yamina Himeur (yhimeur@oxfam.org.pe) Emergency Capacity Building Project Manager, Oxfam GB with the support of Edward Turvill, DRR Advisor, Adaption & Risk Reduction Team, Oxfam GB. For further information on the PCVA Guide, please contact Yamina Himeur.

Participatory Capacity & Vulnerability Analysis (PCVA) is used by Oxfam GB as both an analysis and planning tool. The PCVA process can be used beyond Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR) and by multi-disciplinary teams as it will be relevant to all aspects of NGO programming, from water management to livelihoods. The process enables communities to express their perceptions and understanding of the hazards affecting them, and helps people to plan to reduce the impact that these hazards have on their lives, livelihoods and environment. PCVA is key to Oxfam’s capacity to design and implement successful and participatory Disaster Risk Reduction and Climate Change Adaptation (CCA) programmes with communities.

"Poor people are not completely without abilities and means. Development and humanitarian practitioners need to take into account people's capacities and vulnerabilities if interventions are to be relevant, sustainable and empowering.”

Foreword to the 2002 edition of Oxfam’s PCVA manual, Lilian S. Mercado Carreon, Philippines Programme Representative for Oxfam GB

In 2009, Oxfam developed a PCVA Training Pack, which is currently being improved after pilot training and testing in the Philippines, Malawi, Mozambique, Guatemala, Uganda, Niger and the Occupied Palestinian Territories. Previously PCVA was applied only to disaster risk, but the Oxfam manual has been revised to include guidance on analyzing localised climate change. The PCVA Training Pack is available in 5 languages (Bahasa, English, French, Portuguese, and Spanish) on DVD and in paper format.

PCVA learning in Uganda and Niger

As part of the activities under their ECB Agency Performance Improvement Plan (APIP), Oxfam opened its 2009 PCVA training programmes in Guatemala and Uganda to other ECB agencies. In Niger, the PCVA event became an official ECB training activity which was open to all ECB agencies and consortium partners, and was a training of trainers.

"I feel capable of replicating the training we have just received. This, thanks to the theoretical awareness we got, the simulations we did, and the support that will be available at the end of the training. These 3 elements should enable us to replicate this training well.”

Aichatou Aoula, Food Security Officer, Oxfam International, Niger

Both in Uganda and Niger, where the majority of participants came from agencies and partners other than Oxfam, it was clear that the core elements of PCVA are common to the work of many organisations. Comparing and exchanging experiences greatly added to participants’ learning.

During the training, participants discussed key concepts in DRR as well as cross-cutting issues. They learnt how to use the participatory learning and action techniques and tools (previously known as participatory rural appraisal) and different analytical frameworks, and how to then implement a full PCVA with communities supporting analysis and action planning. After the training, participants should be able to support communities to generate their own analysis of existing risks and to identify and plan for specific adaption and risk reduction measures.

The multi-agency dimension sparked rich debates among participants, furthering their reflexion and challenging some assumptions. In Uganda, “during the plenary discussion on the first group-work on poverty and disasters, an interesting argument came up about whether big family size is capacity or vulnerability. The other one was whether risk taking is capacity or vulnerability” (Felix Omunu, DRR Officer, Oxfam, Uganda). In Niger, during the session which discussed whether disasters are natural or man-made, participants looked at examples from around the world, for example a volcanic eruption in the middle of the ocean, a fire at a market in Niamey, a fire at Oxfam’s head office in the UK, and an earthquake a few miles from the coast of Indonesia. These inter-agency exchanges “enabled us to underline that losses (human, material) will vary according to the context, the vulnerability of communities, and the levels of preparedness” (Fatouma Zara Laouan, Disaster Response and Risk Reduction Coordinator, Plan Niger, Facilitator of the Niger PCVA workshop).

It was also interesting to see that during the field testing preparation, all of the participants focused on the same risk: floods, and did not realise that the visited community also had to face droughts. This underlined the fact that practitioners should exercise extra care to not allow our preconceived ideas to override community realities.

PCVA and the PCVA Training Pack have been developed to apply to the specific focus areas of Oxfam’s programmes, with the aim of understanding risk in order to reduce poverty. However, the PCVA approach is not unique, as, for example, it has many similarities with the Vulnerability and Capacity Assessment (VCA) developed by IFRC and the Participatory Vulnerability Analysis (PVA) developed by ActionAid.

After the first training programme, exchanges have continued. In Uganda, participants from local NGOs, World Vision and Oxfam decided to support each other in their follow-up to the training by planning joint community visits. As part of the next steps at the end of the Uganda training, participants decided to create a community of DRR practitioners in Uganda through a forum where learning events could be held and experiences shared. This group also agreed to organise a range of activities, for example activities to celebrate the International Day for Disaster Risk Reduction last October in Kampala, as members of the Uganda National Platform for DRR.

In Niger, the participants asked government representatives about Niger’s national policy regarding DRR and CCA, and information exchanges followed after the workshop. A follow-up training on DRR and Sphere was also organised by Plan in December and open to some of the previous trainees for whom further training needs had been identified.

Looking forward

Several PCVA trainings are being planned in other countries in 2010, such as Indonesia. ECB agencies and partners will be encouraged to join us again in order to continually gain inter-agency feedback and to build all of our staff capacities to implement this participatory methodology with communities. Oxfam hopes to focus its support on Bolivia, where a PCVA training may take place this year, as well as offering follow-up support to Uganda and Niger.

Oxfam is also developing a supporting PCVA Guide. This short 20-30 page guide explains PCVA methodology, and how it applies to Oxfam's work on adaptation, risk reduction and beyond. It will be released in 2010 and shared with other agencies.

Photo: Ramadan Assi, 2009

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