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What does empowerment mean? How do you empower people? And which people do you empower? These were some of the questions tackled by a specially convened learning circle at this week's Dublin Conference on Hunger, Nutrition and Climate Justice.

We were there to celebrate Ireland's EU Presidency and we were there to inform the post-2015 development agenda, but mostly we were there to learn from each other: to share our experiences and take home practical ideas that we could implement.

In the room were smallholder farmers from Kenya, Malawi, Nepal, and Columbia; development practitioners from the ground and from head-offices; researchers from the social and natural sciences; as well as local and national politicians.

A two-way conversation

Despite our different backgrounds and interests, the room was in unanimous agreement from the get-go: empowerment means knowledge. You can't have one without the other.

But knowledge is not a one-way telegram; it cannot be captured by a report, distilled into a one-page flyer and posted on a village notice board. It must start at the ground, not end at the ground. Social and natural scientists must learn before they can teach. They must learn about traditional farming techniques, about social customs that might present either barriers or opportunities for implementation, about the needs of villagers, and about existing or missing political and social structures. Only then can they design relevant solutions, and only relevant solutions will be successful. 

Over the afternoon we heard about many such successful projects, implemented after a period of community consultation and participation. We heard from Helen Were, who had travelled all the way from Lower Nyando, Kenya, to tell her story.

Stories from the ground

In Helene Were’s community, there are many barriers to food security. There are environmental barriers; increased droughts, floods and unpredictable rainfall patterns, as well as massive soil erosion. 

There are also social barriers: high rates of HIV have reduced the workforce; and traditional gender inequalities disallow women from inheriting or farming land, further reducing the workforce. Food is so scarce that 45 per cent of the children under five are estimated to be malnourished.

But a new project, coordinated by the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS), is changing things. Households have teamed up into self-help groups, and these self-help groups have teamed up with each other under the umbrella group, Friends of Katuk Odeyo (FOKO). Now, other umbrella groups are springing up and over 1,170 households in the Nyando basin belong to self-help groups. Importantly, 70-85 per cent of the active members are women.

“Women are asserting themselves and can control resources now” said Chris Macaloo, Associate Vice President of World Neighbors, Kenya.

FOKO provides its members with access to resources and knowledge. The program has introduced smaller breeds of livestock such as goats, chickens and sheep which are better suited to women's physical abilities. It has introduced crop diversification and beekeeping to help diversify and therefore secure livelihoods. It has also supported 22 tree nurseries to help mitigate climate change, and various measures to fight soil erosion.

FOKO also acts as a collective bank, allowing women in the area access to loans for the first time. For Helen, crop and livestock diversification has meant income from her land and more nutritious and varied food for her children, who now go to school. “I have now been empowered to do so many things” she said, “I understand empowerment as getting skills and implementing. I can implement because I have the skills and I have the knowledge.”

Strong farmer organisations are vital

The project represented many of the key elements which the learning circle identified as crucial to enabling empowerment. It adopted a bottom-up approach and encouraged the community to organize and energize itself rather than relying on outside parties. “It is a really important empowerment issue” commented Bruce Campbell, CCAFS Program Director whilst reflecting on the session: “farmers’ organizations need to be really strong at the local level and link up with the regional level so that international organizations have the channels to reach the ground.” Coordination of households under one umbrella organization, and coordination between various research and development agencies to reach out through that one umbrella organization, has led to a more strategic and efficient development approach.

The project was also designed around the specific social and environmental needs of the local community, after a period of community consultation, and while it provided knowledge and resources, it also created knowledge and resources, making the project self-sustainable. “We learnt because we learnt to listen, and the message that came across is that we do not need charity we do not need hand-outs, we need empowerment, we need a hand-up". This was the surmising message that Jay Naidoo, Learning Circle Super Champion and Chair for the Global Alliance for Improved Nutrition (GAIN) would deliver to the conference the next day, reflecting on the conference itself. It was the same message delivered by the team from FOKO, showing that it doesn’t matter if you are working on a local project or international policy, the keys to success remain the same.

Read the case study: Empowering a local community to address climate risks and food insecurity in Lower Nyando, Kenya

Learn more about how CCAFS uses community consultation and participatory research in our efforts to address climate change:

Read: East Africa reached by participatory action research activities 

Read: Understandingwhat could empower women farmers

CCAFS has also released two guides to help facilitate practitioners using social learning techniques and participatory action research in the field:

Participatory Action Research Methods to Inform Research on Gender and Climate Smart Agriculture 

Unlocking the potential of social learning for climate change and food security: Wicked problems and non-traditional solutions 

Lucy Holt is a Communications Assistant at the CGIAR Research Program onClimate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS). The CCAFS team is reporting live from the Hunger, Nutrition, Climate Justice conference in Dublin from 15-16 April 2013. Watch live webcasts at www.eu2013.ie and follow updates on the CCAFS blog. Engage with us on twitter @cgiarclimate using #HNCJ