Information flows within development are often depicted as either 'top down' i.e. from decision-makers to the poor or 'bottom up' i.e. from the poor to decision-makers. However, within the livestock sector, neither of these two pathways are working terribly efffectively. While it is not surprising that the poor face difficulties with regard to information flows, what is more surprisingis that the poor are not alone. Development decision makers equally suffer from a lack of timely and relevant information. This information vacuum is not only from a 'bottom up' perspective. Rather, decision-makers often lack information regarding the impacts of particular interventions and the potenial effects of their decisions, particularly on poverty. Given these issues, the following thesis explores development information flows from a technological perspective. However, it is important to remember that the poor are not a generic group. Rather, poor livestock keepers have diverse knowledge needs which befit the many subgroups involved in livestock production i.e. women and children. Thus, the author developed three separate tools to address the information needs of decision-makers and a diverse range of poor livestock keepers. The first tool, the Poverty Assessor enables decision-makers to assess the direct poverty impacts of a wide variety of factors important to the well being of poor households such as demographic, geographic and livelihood activities. The programme also enables decision-makers to determine the exact impact of livestock disease on affected households. Finally, as livestock keeping among the poor is not simply an economic activity, the programme contains a component to evaluate the social value of livestock and the social vulnerability of households involved. The second tool developed by the thesis offers a direct means of transferring livestock information to the poor: The Livestock Guru.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:bl.uk/oai:ethos.bl.uk:502487 |
| Date | January 2008 |
| Creators | Yu, Jun |
| Publisher | University of Reading |
| Source Sets | Ethos UK |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
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