Challenges of measuring graduation in Rwanda

Type Journal Article - IDS Bulletin
Title Challenges of measuring graduation in Rwanda
Author(s)
Volume 46
Issue 2
Publication (Day/Month/Year) 2015
Page numbers 103-114
URL https://opendocs.ids.ac.uk/opendocs/bitstream/handle/123456789/7274/IDSB_46_2_10.1111-1759-5436.1213​3.pdf?sequence=1
Abstract
Rwanda demonstrates how a process of community consultation and participation is able to identify
and rank community members according to ‘social poverty’, drawing on the Ubudehe tradition which is
considered a strength of Rwanda’s social fabric. However, with the Ubudehe categorisation now the basis for
determining eligibility to a range of social benefits, the process has come under some strain. This article
highlights two issues related to targeting and graduation: (1) the difficulty in identifying the poor/non-poor
and ranking the population using community participatory techniques; and (2) the sensitivity of eligibility
criteria and graduation thresholds to different targeting modalities. Our primary interest is to establish
whether improvements for identifying the poor and non-poor can be made without undermining community
ownership and what these improvements would look like. This will be useful for policymakers in Rwanda as
the new five-year development strategy places importance on graduating households out of extreme poverty

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