Knowledge Fairs Should Be Prepared at the Beginning of the Projects

[Marie Lamboray]

I share this blog on behalf of Jean Baby Fulama, facilitator in DRC:

The Knowledge Fair in the Kalenda Health Zone went well, and we have almost finished our report. The support team of the GCSE project of the Zone will soon send me the contribution of some villages who are applying SALT.

Here is a small thing that I would like to share with you: I say in my report that the Knowledge Fair should, in my opinion, be prepared from the start of a project, at the same time as the implementation of the action plans of the communities by the communities. During the project, Local facilitators, support team and Health Areas teams will ensure the capture of best practices, prepare community members to present their stories of change and then gradually share with the projects stakeholders, but also already talk about it with potential internal and external partners who will be interested in supporting the process to ensure that it will be sustainable and extended to other themes developed in the Zone.

For example, going out on the field at more than 28 Km from the Central Bureau of Health Zone and from the site of the Knowledge Fair, allowed us to meet two great communities who did not participate to the fair, but who offered us two beautiful stories that we brought back. The facilitator who transferred the approach with the two communities shared the stories. One of these two communities is outside the Health Areas selected by the project. And how many great stories and experiences are left untold?

Thus, joint missions will be quarterly monitored and evaluated to validate the data gradually and cooperatively. Why? Because a lot of experiences and stories remain untapped in the Knowledge Fairs, simply for the reason that the number of participants and the mobility of community members depend on the budget for the activity, and we close the project with only a sample of people available.

The SALT approach has not sufficiently showcased its prowess in various communities of the world because of financial reasons among other. So we need to adapt our response. Thank you.

Jean Baby FULAMA,

RDCCompétence

Photo album of the event

[Phil]

Jean Baby, thank you so very much for the story and for the pictures. I appreciate the work and effort that it takes to document these stories. And thank you for the lesson based on your experience, I will use it. 

[Rituu B. Nanda]

Thanks Marie for your great job in translating the story and presenting it with the photo album. Bravo!

If possible please could you get more elaboration on what does Jean mean by knowledge fair preparation at start of the project. Also also an example for this statement already talk about it with potential internal and external partners who will be interested in supporting the process to ensure that it will be sustainable and extended to other themes developed in the Zone.

[Marlou]

Beautiful sharing. Many thanks Jean Baby - and thanks to Marie for the support in sharing. Supporting communities in sharing their story at each step of the process is a role indeed that all of us SALT facilitators should aim to grow in. I so much look forward to read the community stories you mention Jean-Baby. Could you share the most beautiful ones here as well? With gratitude, Marlou