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Costs 

The Kenya SCALE application lasted one year and cost approximately US$150,000, with in-kind contributions of US$100,000 from the World Agroforestry Centre (ICRAF). This included paying for a major planning workshop and supporting a small coordination unit. A regional training-of-trainers plant health rallies course (for 15 people from four countries) cost an estimated US$15,000. The basic cost (fuel, printed material) of a two-day plant health campaign involving two teams of 16 people is around US$100. Campaigns will vary in scale and scope, and therefore these are indicative costs only.

BOX 3: SCALE – system-wide collaborative action for livelyhoods and the environment 

SCALE is a structured approach for amplifying a proven but underutilised technology. The aim is to increase awareness and technology uptake (scaling-up) through strengthened partnerships and collaborative actions. Campaigns are an important element of this approach. 

The SCALE approach has been used in Kenya to improve dairy production. It is relatively costly in terms of resources and time, but with proportionally greater long-term benefits. Multiple players from multiple sectors are involved from the start, when they map the context and agree what should be addressed. In Kenya a workshop brought together 100+ people from 80 organisations to consider practical ways to help small-scale dairy farmers. The group agreed to promote fodder shrubs, one of several competing ideas. Once consensus was achieved, participants could focus on how to work together in channelling information to farmers. 

SCALE attempts to catalyse coalitions and partnerships by building trust and mutual confidence. In Kenya, participants considered both real and perceived reasons why organisations didn’t work together, facilitating a shift from competition and confrontation towards collaboration. The next step was to create collaborative, sustainable solutions and identify participants’ contributions, an essential prerequisite before direct actions could begin. 

SCALE helps to build social capital around a specific development topic, with positive effects for participants as well as target audiences. Local, targeted campaigns show the positive ways that different organisations can add value. In Kenya, the mass media were active partners and advocates of fodder shrubs, rather than mere reporters of what others were doing. About 100,000 farmers obtained seeds of fodder shrubs after this one-year project, compared with 40,000 farmers over the previous eight years. It was unclear, however, how many farmers had successfully planted seeds as a result of the SCALE efforts

Strengths and weaknesses

Strengths 

  • Campaigns can reach many people in a short time with a clear message and a simple solution or proven technology. 
  • The alliances and partnerships formed during campaigns stimulate new collaborations that often continue after the campaign has ended. 
  • Campaigns create a strong unity of purpose, encouraging contributions from organisations that boost resources and increase the scope of activities. 
  • Campaigns can be run at all geographic scales and need not be expensive or require major planning. 

Weaknesses 

  • Launching campaigns (particularly large-scale ones) can become over-reliant on project funds and international organisations, ignoring opportunities that are locally led. 
  • Coordination can be challenging, particularly ensuring the timely availability of recommended inputs (e.g. seeds) and information (e.g. planting rates). 
  • Partners with competing interests may complicate planning and implementation. 
  • Measuring of outcomes is often weak, partly because it is difficult to ascribe change to campaigns alone, and because not enough emphasis is given to assessment during planning.