Chair: Dietmar Stoian
Over the past decade, many governmental, private and donor-funded programs have adopted value chain development (VCD) to address goals related to poverty reduction and economic development. Despite considerable investments in VCD, we have a poor understanding of whether these interventions allow smallholders to move out of poverty. A major stumbling block has been the absence of sound metric systems to monitor progress and assess the impact of VCD initiatives. The 5Capitals methodology, developed jointly by an alliance of research and development organizations, addresses this shortcoming by proposing an asset-based approach to assess the poverty impacts of VCD. 5Capitals helps assess changes in critical assets – human, social, natural, physical and financial capitals – managed by smallholder households and the enterprises that link them with other value chain actors. Underpinning 5Capitals is the belief that the greater a household’s access to such assets, the higher its well-being and resilience. Similarly, higher asset endowment at enterprise level is expected to translate into enhanced business viability.
The 5 capitals: Key household and business assets for VDC assessment
| Natural | Stock of environmentally provided assets including, soil health, forest cover and diversity, minerals, water, stock of plants or animals |
| Human | Capacities and skills, formal education, nutritional and health status |
| Social | Rules, norms, obligations, reciprocity and trust embedded in social relations, structures or arrangements that enable those who share it to achieve goals they could not achieve individually |
| Physical | Tools, equipment, machinery, buildings, other built or productive resources |
| Financial | Cash, savings, equity, credit and other financial resources |
The core version of the tool focuses on household and enterprise levels but, given disparities between men and women in agricultural development, a team is now working on a gender-responsive version of 5Capitals which looks inside the household to determine gender-differentiated access to and control over assets, and the implications for livelihood resilience at household level, as well as business viability at enterprise level.
The major focus of this workshop will be to introduce the 5Capitals methodology, share experiences about its application, and discuss options for adapting a gender-responsive version of the methodology to the needs of the Project as regards the surveys. Working groups will discuss: 1) links between this methodology and the other approaches emerged during the conference for assessing livelihood resilience with a particular attention to neglected and underutilized species.; 2) links between the methodology and key gender aspects to be addressed by the Project and 3) whether additional assets should be considered, in reflecting on the drivers and indicators of poverty.
This is an open event for the participants of the Conference "Agrobiodiversity to manage risks and empower the poor". Any participant who wishes to attend is welcome. We specifically request participation from the following:
Nadia Bergamini, Bioversity International | Silvana Maselli, UVG |
08.30-08.50 S. Padulosi: Introduction to the session and its relevance to the project
08.50-09.20 D. Stoian: Making the Five Capitals Methodology gender responsive
09.20-09.40 P. Ceci: Experiences with the Five Capitals Methology in West Africa
09.40-10.00 Coffee Break
10.00-11.00 Working groups
11.00-12.30 Sharing outcome of working groups and discussion
12.30-13.30 Lunch
