Professional Documents
Culture Documents
May 2010
Best Practices & Innovations (BPI) Initiative
Agriculture & Rural Livelihoods
Food Security
CASA “Road to Health” & MANA More Food and Agro‐ecological Businesses
World Vision Honduras
Best Practice Award for Nutrition and Productivity
Overview:
The goal of World Vision’s Food Security and Risk Reduction Program for Western Honduras (2004‐
2009), funded by USAID, was to reduce household food insecurity by improving health and nutrition and
increasing food access. Approximately 157,000 Hondurans throughout 128 communities were served.
This was achieved through two integrated components: (1) Road to Health (CASA), focused on improving
the nutritional status of women and children, as well as increasing access to health services access and
water and sanitation; and (2) More Food and Agro‐ecological Businesses (MANA), focused on
agricultural production, markets access and natural resources management, as well as civil society
municipal strengthening and citizenry participation.
Intervention Details:
Location Honduras ‐ The best practices initiatives were developed in eight
municipalities of Far Western Honduras that correspond to the
departments of Copan and Ocotopeque.
Start Date October 1, 2004
End Date September 30, 2009
Scale Local/Community
Target Population Children under the age of five, pregnant and lactating women, families,
community leaders and small agricultural producers
Number of beneficiaries Approximately 69,500 direct and more than 157,000 indirect beneficiaries
in the eight municipalities, including children under the age of five,
pregnant and lactating women, small producers and families in 128
communities.
Partners Counterpart International (CPI); Municipal Association of Copan Ruinas,
Santa Rita, Cabañas and San Jerónimo ( MANCORSARIC); National
Foundation for the Development of Honduras (FUNED); Honduran Institute
of Forest Conservation (ICF); Japanese International Cooperation Agency
(JICA); USAID‐ Rural Economic Diversification Program.
Funders/Donors USAID
Total Funding US$ 20,508,839 for the entire program
(Direct funding for the initiatives: CASA “Road to Health” ‐ $1,841,255 and
MANA More Food and Agro‐ecological Businesses ‐ $2,752,364)
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About the Intervention
1. Background/Context
What challenges or problems were the interventions designed to address? Why was the intervention
needed?
Honduras continues to be one of the poorest and least developed nations in the Western Hemisphere,
with almost 65% of the national population classified as poor. Families struggle to meet basic needs
while confronting obstacles such as, high levels of unemployment, high fertility rates (4.1 children per
woman in rural areas), and increasing natural resource degradation.
The far western region of Honduras has been identified as deserving of special attention due to its high
rates of malnourished children, poor dietary diversity, and low incomes, employment and levels of
education. The lack of access to health services in the far west is somewhat due to the difficulty of the
terrain, as it is one of the more mountainous area of the country bordering El Salvador and Guatemala.
The average farmer only has, at best, one hectare (about 2.5 acres) of arable land to produce food for
sustenance and/or sale. Most people earn incomes through day labor with low wages, few benefits
and no job security.
Data in the intervention area include:
• 59% of people work as day laborers in agriculture or cattle‐raising.
• Rapid survey classified 28% of households as indigent and another 48% as poor.
• 45% of the population is under the age of fifteen.
• Only 23% of women have completed primary school.
• The region has relatively low population density, with disperse centers of population.
• 61% of the population lives more than one hour from health services.
2. Goals & Objectives
What were the intervention’s goals and objectives? What was it meant to accomplish?
Health component: CASA “Road to Health”
Strategic Objective: Increased Household health and nutrition
• Improved nutritional status of women and children.
• Improved access to and use of mother and child health services.
• Increased access to potable water and basic sanitation.
Agriculture Component: MANA More Food and Agro‐ecological Businesses
Strategic Objective: Protected and enhanced household access to food
• Increased agricultural production and diversification.
• Improved market access.
• Improved natural resource management.
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3. Key Activities
Please describe the intervention’s main activities. What role did each partner play? If applicable, how is
the intervention innovative?
Health component: CASA “Road to Health”
KEY STRATEGIES
A. Implementation of the Integrated Child Health Care approach (AIN‐C) for community‐based growth
monitoring and promotion for children 0 to 23 months of age:
• AIN‐C Module No.1: Recommended feeding practices for children age 0 to 23 months
• AIN‐C Module No.2: Prevention and management of common childhood illnesses
• AIN‐C Module No.3: Care of the newborn
B. Use of Olla Comun/PD Hearth for recuperation of malnourished (weight for age) children
C. Collaboration with health services to promote priority messages of the Secretariat of Health and
with promotion of the use of available health services for children and women, with referral from
community AIN‐C Monitors.
D. Establishment of a limited number of Community Health Units (CHU) in remote areas. These are
staffed by community volunteers, AIN‐C Monitors, and provide treatment for diarrhea and/or
pneumonia. Medicines are supplied through the regional health units of the Secretariat and/or
complementary funds.
Agriculture Component: MANA More Food and Agro‐ecological Businesses
KEY STRATEGIES
A. Establishment Farmer Field Schools to facilitate the adoption of recommended agricultural
production practices, in which the farmers are trained on demonstration plots to test new crops
and agricultural practices.
B. Exchange of visits between Field School participants in different communities.
C. Coordination with municipal government to facilitate the use of the subsidy from the Secretariat of
Agriculture and Cattle (SAG) provided to small producers, including supplies of improved seeds
(corn and beans) and fertilizer donated by the Secretariat of Agriculture.
D. Organization of community banks and rural banks.
E. Coordination with institutions such as the SAG, Zamorano, MCA‐Honduras, FTDA, FINTRAC, ICF,
SERNA, IHCAFE, FAO, municipal governments, NGO’s working in environment and rural
development, primary schools, high schools and community organizations.
F. Legalization of small businesses.
Results of the intervention, benefiting approximately 69,500 people, including children under the age
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of five, pregnant and lactating women, small producers and families in 128 communities:
INDICATOR 2005 2009
Decrease in the percentage of children from 6‐36 months 46% 38.7%
with chronic malnutrition.
Decrease in the percentage of children from 6‐36 months 30.1% 23.3%
who are underweight.
Increase in the percentage of children < 2 years who 23% 37%
received exclusive breastfeeding during the first 6 months of
life.
Increase in the percentage of births attended to by trained 40% 66.2%
TBA or other personnel (includes institutional births).
Increase in the number of municipalities with a food security
project in their Development Plans, including the resources 0 8
assignation.
Increase in the percentage of families with a diversified diet. 57% 65.2%
Increase in the percentage of farmers using at least four
sustainable agro‐forestry practices. 17% 82.6%
Increase in the number of farmers cultivating crops/ 0 607
products for the market
Increase in the number of producer associations with direct 0 27
market linkages. More than 600
farmers
The information above is supported in the annual monitoring report of the project and final evaluation
report (See annex for Final Evaluation). A qualitative and quantitative evaluation was carried out to
develop the final evaluation report and to provide input into analysis of results.
5. Equitable Outcomes
Describe how the intervention enabled the participation of and produced benefits for women. Please
provide data showing the comparative benefits for men and women. If the intervention focused
exclusively on men, please explain the rationale for doing so.
Gender was a central cross‐cutting element of all components of these initiatives, with the goal of
ensuring equitable participation of men and women. Analysis of monitoring system information
sometimes included analysis of participation by sex in the different activities.
In the nutrition and health component, women participated much more than men; the majority of the
AIN‐C Monitors are female. Although a balance of gender is generally desirable in community
development activities, the AIN‐C protocols recommend that the promoters be women (and women
with children), because it is important that they serve as examples and counselors so that other
mothers change their feeding practices for children under the age of two. The Monitors received
training which allowed them to offer a new service to the community and allowed them to be linked to
new institutional spaces with municipal governments and health establishments. With this, they
earned prestige, recognition and greater self‐empowerment with their technical capacity and
leadership.
Through health activities, women also benefited from increases in use of modern family planning
methods, access to prenatal, delivery and post‐partum check‐ups, as well as new knowledge for the
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prevention of HIV/AIDS.
In the commercialization and micro‐business component, the participation of men and women can be
seen with the following example:
PARTICIPATION OF PARTICIPATION OF
ACTIVITY TOTAL
MEN WOMEN
Micro‐businesses for processing 70% 30% 100%
agricultural products
Women participated on the Boards of Directors of all small businesses, creating opportunities for them
to participate in decision making.
6. Efficiency/Cost‐Effectiveness
How do the intervention’s relative costs compare to the outcomes achieved? Please provide evidence
to support your answer.
As of September 30, 2009, the program achieved an overall performance of 92% of its targets. The
Health component achieved 92% of its planned activities and the Agriculture component 93%. WV
expended US$ 1,841,255 for CASA “Road to Health” and US$ 2,752,364 for MANA More Food and
Agro‐ecological Businesses with amounted to a $66/beneficiary investment over the life of the
program. Some of the achievements of this investment are listed below:
Health Component: CASA “Road to Health”
Improved nutritional status of targeted women and children:
• The target for monthly growth monitoring of children under the age of two was 2,627 children.
WVH reached 2,520 children (1,235 boys and 1,285 girls), or 96% of the target.
• A total of 4,902 families, reaching 99% of the target (4,961) were supplied with Title II food
rations.
• WV increased the number of mothers that practiced exclusive breastfeeding during the first six
months from Baseline 23% to 37% at Final Evaluation. Another impact achieved was the
percentage increase of mothers with appropriate child‐feeding practices in children ages 0‐
23months, Baseline 15% BL to 32.5% at Final Evaluation.
Increased access to mother and child health services:
• The target of 359 Community Health Volunteers (CHVs) accredited by the Ministry of Health
was met by 92%.
• Advances in the decentralization and empowerment of local government in health. As of June
2009, seven municipal governments in the WV target areas demonstrated a commitment to
assist communities and CHVs to maintain the existing services without the PROGRAM.
• A total of 480 coffee harvesters were trained in preventive HIV & AIDs as part of WVH’s
Learning Model.
Increased access to potable water and basic sanitation:
• The target for %HH with access to safe water was 87%. By the end of program, 89% of HHs had
access to safe water.
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• WVH increased the percentage of HHs with access to latrines from Baseline 11% to Final
Evaluation 50%. .
Agriculture Component: MANA More Food and Agro‐ecological Businesses
Increased agricultural production and diversification:
• 2,113 family gardens (117% of the target) were developed in an integrated manner by health
and agriculture community leaders in targeted households.
• In addition, 533 families transferred vegetative material to other families in the communities
for them to either diversify crops or start their own family gardens.
• The number of months of adequate food supply in the target areas of WV showed
improvement, reaching the final target with an increase of 1.3 months.
• To tackle food scarcity in the communities, a total of 15 municipal grain banks with the
capacity of 50 qq. each were installed. The banks also helped farmer groups generate more
utilities as they were able to stock grains to sell when the prices were higher in the market.
• A total of 23 solar driers were established, exceeding the target of the 17 originally planned.
The low cost and high impact in using this technology to conserve grain quality generated
acceptability and ample diffusion, especially among coffee farmers participating in farm
certification. Participating farmers received financial support from municipalities and
assistance from IHCAFE. A total of 130 solar driers capable of drying 1,820 qq. of coffee
per/week were installed by PROGRAM farmers. Coffee farmers receive higher prices for their
coffee when it has less moisture.
Improved market access:
• 29 micro enterprises were legalized, allowing them better conditions to access credit, obtain
sales contracts, as well as mobilize other benefits and resources.
• A total of 5 enterprises are supporting 5 Community Health Units and education activities in
their communities, providing them with materials, labor and fundraising as part of the
Program’s work in creating awareness of Enterprise social responsibility.
• WVH assisted small businesses to develop 75 marketing plans.
Improved natural resource management:
• The target of 8 nurseries with variety of trees and plants was exceeded by 75%; 14 were
installed.
• WVH, beginning with a baseline value of 60 hectares, surpassed its the target of 400 hectares
rehabilitating 1,369 hectares by the end of the project..
• Seven Environmental Consultative Groups were organized with the Municipal Technical Units
to follow‐up on mitigation measures and risk‐management activities in their communities.
7. Sustainability
Is this intervention sustainable in the long‐term, socially, financially and environmentally? Please
describe the steps the intervention took to ensure services or impacts will be sustained over the long
term, and the role of local partners or the beneficiary community in continuing the intervention.
Health component: CASA “Road to Health”
Many of the project activities and all of the achieved improvements in child and maternal nutrition and
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health have a strong likelihood of being sustained. This is due to elements of sustainability that were
part of the project design, including:
• Coordination with local government with clear expectations that local government would be
involved in providing some level of sustainability to project health activities at the community
level. Ensuring that local government members were aware of project activities through
presentations and field visits.
• Provision of appropriate job aids and education materials to community participants.
• Implementation of models that have successfully changed mother and child caretaker feeding
practices.
• Ensuring that the key program health and nutrition strategy – the AIN‐C model – remains a
government priority at the national level through frequent supervision and additional refresher
training.
• Promotion of the PD/Hearth model for community‐based recuperation of moderate
malnutrition through the CORE Group (www.coregroup.org). An on‐going Technical Advisory
Group is a forum for NGOs to share experiences and approaches for use of this model in
different settings. World Vision headquarters staff contributes to this forum.
• Management by trained Community Health Workers of the project model for a limited number
of Community Health Units as part of the Honduran government decentralization process and
its commitment to equitable health service provision, a model that could be taken to national
scale. It would be useful if the experiences of MANCORSARIC municipal governments in taking
over the management and oversight of Community Health Units that were established by
World Vision and another NGO would be closely documented and lessons broadly shared from
this experience.
• Training enabled communities to emphasize the sustainability of program interventions by
including them in their Community Development Plans and negotiating with their local
governments for the inclusion of these activities in the Municipal Strategic Development Plans
(PEDM).
• Mobilization of municipal funding for program activities.
Agriculture Component: MANA More Food and Agro‐ecological Businesses:
• Training events used techniques that transferred capacities to participants and included
opportunities for immediately practicing each newly‐acquired skill.
• Final evaluation results show that agricultural producers and mothers with young children have
changed their behavior in positive ways in terms of the advice promoted. This behavioral
change is lasting because the individual has passed through the initial steps of acquiring new
knowledge and then reflecting on the advantages to putting it into practice.
• Community volunteers received training through the activities of this program have high
quality technical skills and serve as models for promoting continuous changes within the
community.
• Volunteer Model Farmers have stated their intention to continuing to plant the new crops and
use sustainable agriculture techniques. They serve as a source of information for whoever
wishes to continue to change their behavior as producers.
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• Small businesses are still in their first years of operation, but with the motivation to generate
income, newly acquired skills in maintaining basic accounting ledgers, new market contacts
and legal status, they should be able to advance. Municipal governments already support and
coordinate the Agricultural Fairs with groups of agricultural producers.
• Qualitative evaluation showed that collaborating members already feel that the program
activities are “theirs”. The strategic and annual plans of municipal governments include
activities to promote and protect food security. Mayors and government technicians have
coordinated directly with the Model Farmer volunteers and members of community groups or
small businesses in road maintenance during the life of the program. Thus, the governments
are familiar with the strengthened local skills and capacities that they can rely on in future
activities.
• Municipal governments and councils of municipal governments (MANCORSARIC) agreements
have been signed with Cooperating Sponsors in almost all the communities that have been
involved. In these agreements they have agreed to support existing activities.
8. Challenges & Lessons Learned
What challenges or obstacles did you face and how were they addressed? What are the most important
lessons a reader should take from this practice?
The lessons learned by the program generally centered on better ways to implement activities,
adapting to the local context through a more in‐depth understanding of participant needs and
capacities.
The Program developed three documents that systematize program activities with the participation of
beneficiaries, Program staff and partners. Below are some of the lessons learned from the program
component:
Health Component: CASA Road to Health:
• WV was able to tackle the fact that intelligent active people will seek (and will likely need to
seek) opportunities to earn money and that this often leads to emigration out of the
community of trained CHVs, in contrast to their commitment to civic service. This emigration
was minimized through the program’s strategy of creating effective income generation
opportunities from the beginning of program implementation, maximizing opportunities that
promote sustainability and minimizing attrition among effective volunteers.
• Although the PD/Hearth model was adapted to the local context of food insecurity, with WVH
providing most of the ingredients used in the Hearth food preparation, a lesson learned by
staff was the importance of developing a local agricultural calendar so that reasonable
expectations for community contributions could be emphasized and this aspect of the Hearth
learning process could be maintained.
• In the training of community volunteers for the C‐IMCI component, an important lesson
learned early on by the program was the opportunity to observe cases contributed to building
CHV skills more quickly. Although this sometimes required additional time, effort, and budget
up front, it was worthwhile overall, as those that did not observe cases during training needed
additional and more frequent supportive supervision to develop the same skill level.
• Ensuring a regular supply of essential medicines for treatment of common childhood illness is a
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critical aspect of the C‐IMCI model. An important lesson learned is that community
organizations need additional tools and training on procurement issues, such as calculating
drug needs, as they do not have extensive experience in this area. Under‐provision of critical
drugs can greatly affect the impact of the C‐IMCI strategy, while over‐provision can negatively
impact processes (such as the recovery of small fees or local health unit interest in becoming a
sustainable provider) that are meant to function as elements of sustainability for the CHUs.
• Since the inception of the Program, the intentional coordination with the eight local
governments with clear expectations that they would be involved in providing some level of
sustainability to the Program, both during and after the project end date, provided both local
governments and project participants with a sense of ownership and helped them to recognize
the importance of valuing the work performed by their community health volunteers.
• The involvement of local MOH personnel in all training of community volunteers and
encouraging them to participate in supportive supervision of volunteers was key to the
Program’s exit strategy. This built trust between volunteers and local MOH staff and created a
backup system when WV volunteers were absent.
• As part of the Honduran government’s commitment to equitable health service provision, the
limited number of project CHUs managed by trained CHV is a model that could be taken to
national scale. It would be useful if the experiences of the MANCORSARIC municipal
government in taking over the management and oversight of Community Health Units would
be closely documented and if these lessons were broadly shared from this experience. (Refer
to WV´s DAP Documentation of the Child and Maternal Nutrition and Health Intervention
Strategy, Joan Jennings, February 2009.)
Agriculture Component: MANA More Food and Agro‐ecological Businesses
The implementation of the Farmer Field Schools (FFS) generated multiple learnings that have been
shared through the systematizations document to strengthen existing FFS in the PROGRAM area and to
share the experience with other WV projects, as well as other organizations.
• World Vision was innovative in the application of the standard methodology of the FFS, which
could be applied to obtain greater impact in rural development in Honduras. The PROGRAM
went beyond the standard methodology, which is centered on integrated crop management,
to include elements of enterprise development and organization in more than 50 FFS
established.
• An intentional visioning process since the inception of the FFS should have considered the
farmers` vision beyond production cycles (program goals) and good agriculture practices,
adding the organizational super structural aspects in a long term process for more
sustainability of the farmer groups and their development of leadership and management
capacities.
• A cost‐benefit evaluation of the FFS applied by the PROGRAM would be very valuable for WV
and for other organizations, especially those that want to use this methodology but have fewer
resources. There is an estimate cost per capita per/ FFS of $121.
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9. Enabling Factors & Recommendations
What factors were critical to the success of the intervention? What should others know about this
intervention before replicating it elsewhere?
World Vision Honduras, through the CASA child and maternal nutrition and health intervention within
their Food Security Project in far western Honduras, has incorporated some consistent KEYS TO
SUCCESS through program design and implementation:
• Selection of three proven strategic models for child nutrition and health that were developed
with expert technical assistance and significant support from USAID partners for promotion
and dissemination: Integrated Child Care in Communities, PD/Hearth and Community‐Based
Integrated Management of Childhood Illness. The combined effect of these three models
enables the project to address both preventive and curative aspects of child and maternal
nutrition and health.
• Involvement of international and local experts when establishing the models and training staff
and community volunteers.
• Development of additional support materials for these models with input from experts,
developing.
• Investment of efforts in developing the skills of volunteer Community Health Workers as
critical change agents.
• Involvement of local health center staff as co‐facilitators in the training and supportive
supervision of Community Health Workers so that they are very familiar with the project
strategies and supportive of these initiatives as they perceive the capacity of Community
Health Workers and the benefits to the goals and objectives of the Ministry of Health.
Recommendations:
• World Vision has invested in documenting the strategies used in the activities carried out in the
program and has disseminated these documents to their field offices throughout the world.
Considering the success seen with the results of this program, access to documentation by
putting it on the Internet should be taken advantage of, with use of list serves and other
mediums supported by USAID.
• There are plans to collaborate with a technical specialist in evaluating the sustainability of
activities, based on the exit strategies developed 18 months prior to the end of the program. It
is recommended that these plans are followed, as there are good signs of potential
sustainability seen during final evaluation and it is important to document and learn from this
experience.
• It would be useful to obtain funding to further advance the activities to establish small business
groups. The level of development of these groups is still in early stages. There are many
challenges to small business faced by families in poor communities, and a program limited to
only five years and with multiple components cannot be sufficient to bring small businesses to
a sustainable stage.
• Community volunteers (for example, Model Farmers and the AIN‐C Monitors) and the small
business groups have acquired excellent capacities and should be a top consideration of
municipal governments and national institutions or other organizations active in the
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components of agricultural production, environmental protection, health and nutrition
promotion for mothers and children, road maintenance and infrastructure, and the
improvement of commercialization in local markets.
10. Replicability/Adaptability
Has this intervention been successfully replicated or adapted in another setting? If so, where, when and
by whom?
World Vision Honduras has developed some initiatives as a result of the successful experiences of this
project, specifically the Farmer Field Schools and Community and rural Banks experiences.
Furthermore, the evaluation results show that the initiatives are highly replicable in other communities
or regions.
All the methodologies have been proven and have demonstrated their adaptability according to
context, and the exchange of documentation (systematization and lessons learned) will allow other
organizations to replicate or improve the interventions of this successful program.