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Bambari, Ouaka, Central African Republic
2019 - 2021
Short description
The project interventions aim to contribute to strengthening the recovery and reintegration of women and girls, through climate-resilient agriculture, to establish peace and reconciliation in the Central African Republic (CAR). The project addressed the urgent problem of climate change, which has long been a cause of conflict in the CAR, with consequences for the resilience of women and girls. They are the main farmers who see their fields destroyed without a legal response because they have no control or land rights. The project focused on strengthening the climate resilience of rural women and girls, including displaced, returned and repatriated women and girls, those associated with armed groups and conflicts or from host communities, as well as women’s cooperative societies, and improve their access to market opportunities. Therefore, the project contributed to the professionalization and empowerment of women producer organizations, cooperatives and federations, through support for the (re)dynamization of organizational life, and support for the organization and structuring of members. Lastly, the project promoted gender equity, prioritizing the empowerment of women through social inclusion initiatives. This provided opportunities for marginalized or minority groups such as women and girls associated with armed groups, people with disabilities, victims of gender-based violence and other forms of violence affecting their well-being.
Main purpose
Climate adaptation / resilience,
Food security,
Provision / protection / diversification of employment and livelihoods / poverty reduction,
Improved market / trade / prices of natural resources,
Land tenure equality and security,
Increasing community cohesion / community building,
Gender equality,
Effective conflict mediation and resolution mechanism
Increasing agricultural productivity / crop and cattle protection
Other expected benefits
Reduced human-wildlife conflicts,
Reduced environmental degradation from sustainable resource use,
Trust building between conflicting groups,
Protection of forcibly displaced persons and returnees
Conflict context
Since the early 1990s, the CAR has been faced with successive political, economic and social crises, as well as armed conflicts that have led to the deterioration of the security context, infrastructure and social cohesion, thus contributing to a general deterioration in the living conditions of the population, especially women and girls. Women are all the more affected by this situation and by poverty in general as deep disparities between men and women persist in the country and in all key sectors of development.
Nevertheless, 2019 saw some significant progress towards peace and the rule of law. The negotiations between the Central African government and fourteen armed groups that led to the signing of a peace agreement in Bangui on 6 February 2019 allowed some armed group leaders to join the government. The programs set up for the reintegration of combatants into civilian life have also enabled some progress in the west of the country. Despite threats from armed groups, Central Africans were able to vote on Sunday, December 27, 2020, to elect the President of the Republic and members of parliament, and the much-feared outbreak of violence ultimately did not occur. In addition, the Political Agreement for Peace and Reconciliation (APPR-RCA) signed on 6 February 2019 with 14 armed groups, provides a roadmap for long-term stability and peace, even after armed groups linked to the Coalition of Patriots for Change (CPC) left the agreement in December 2020.
However, to date, although there are some promising improvements towards institutional stability and the democratization process, with the establishment of a new government in late June 2021 following successful presidential and legislative elections, the political and security situation remains precarious. According to data from the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) as of 30 January 2021, there were over 632,000 refugees and 630,834 internally displaced persons in the country due to persistent insecurity. Climate change has far-reaching consequences and creates conflicts in both urban and rural areas. This makes women’s living conditions difficult in a context where 81% of women are poor in rural areas compared to 69% of men and where much of the population is female (50.48%) in agriculture.
Peace and security contributions
- By 2021, the main beneficiaries of the Project (women and girls from host communities, associated with armed groups and conflicts, displaced, returned and repatriated, women’s cooperative societies) have strengthened social cohesion among themselves and in their respective communities, and advocacy for an environment favorable to women farmers (including access to land) has been initiated.
- By the end of the project, the productivity and profitability of vulnerable women and girls from host communities and victims of conflict-related violence involved in sustainable, climate-resilient animal, plant, fish and fisheries sectors have increased.
- By the end of the project, the main beneficiaries have improved access to appropriate financial services and products and have strengthened their capacities in microfinance institutions, organic farming and agroecology.
Reported elements of good practices
- The implementation of the project is based on a comprehensive results framework, highlighting the expected results of the project and the financial means to obtain them, but also the means of measuring the results. Carrying out activities without a clear vision of the results and objectives of the project therefore does not allow them to be achieved.
- The development of strong partnerships with national NGOs, active in the field for a long time, helps to build trust among populations and thus improve the acceptability of the project and strengthen their participation.
- Continued proximity and dialogue among stakeholders, particularly between implementing agencies, all implementing partners and the government, are critical to achieving joint results.
Reported challenges
- Without real involvement of national institutions in the implementation from the beginning, the chances of a real partnership for the sustainability of the results will be reduced.
- Define a simpler and more engaging theory of change, achievable according to the means available, accompanied by critical hypotheses, and broken down into an easy-to-use results framework.
- Accelerate the process of adopting the Land Code, by integrating the broad outlines of the “Local Land Governance Charter” with a view to facilitating access to agricultural land for women and vulnerable populations.
- Stabilize the State agents/executives designated as focal points in the projects, because the transfers of the latter and the designation of new ones during the implementation hinder the effective implementation and monitoring of the projects.
- Establish mechanisms for resolving agricultural land conflicts, to resolve problems arising between traditional occupants of land which they consider they own through transmission from generation to generation, and the state to which considers to own the land according to Central African law.
- Organize well (agree and decide by mutual agreement) on the management of the resources made available for animal-drawn cultivation (oxen and plows), in order to avoid conflicts between groups on the one hand and between beneficiaries on the other.
Practical details of implementation
The Project has shown that it is possible to have tangible results with rapid impacts, in a short time, and without sacrificing much quality.
- Conflict-sensitivity: one of the objectives of the project is peacebuilding. It has therefore sought and succeeded in strengthening social cohesion through its various actions in a short period of time. However, the evaluation mission noted that some unfinished interventions presented potential sources of conflict, for example:
– discordances between the project beneficiaries supported by UN Women and FAO;
– beneficiaries who have not received certain allocations;
– beneficiary groups that have more people than the number supported by the project;
– some plots of land allocated by the State to the project beneficiaries with traditional land occupants who threatened to prevent their occupation;
– the distribution of a limited set of oxen (5 pairs) for draught cultivation given to the 50 groups of Bambari and Pissa, who must share them to plow 500 ha of land; and
– the costs of the distributed oxen during the months when there is no ploughing or draught work to perform.
This discontent can lead to a feeling of discrimination and social conflicts. All groups, local authorities, decentralized services and CSO implementing partners agree that the fair use of the oxen could be a source of conflict. Therefore FAO decided to provide another ten additional oxen from its own funds. - Gender: all the project initiatives are essentially focused on women, the main victims of inequalities and conflicts in the CAR. The empowerment of women is therefore at the heart of the project, but in all the beneficiary groups, there are more or less 20% men. Ultimately, the project is therefore focused on gender-related issues, and not only on the problems faced by women. The gender and human rights-based approach was also considered by integrating into the project activities, awareness-raising not only among rights holders, in this case women and girls, but also duty-bearers such as public authorities, particularly in terms of women’s access to land, violence against women, as well as the empowerment of women in general.
- Inclusive programming: Although not very visible, members of the groups stated that marginalized groups such as young girls, people living with disabilities, and minorities were included among the beneficiaries of the project activities. Although the project is intended to be fully inclusive, including for people living with disabilities, the project evaluators did not explicitly see the measures taken to provide specific support to people with disabilities, especially in agriculture, both in its design and implementation.
- Sustainability: the project has put in place some measures to promote ownership of the results, including implementation partnership agreements with certain institutions and national NGOs. However, regular consultations with the ministries and institutions in charge of the sectors concerned, within the framework of the project Steering Committee, which were supposed to promote the sustainability of the achievements, did not take place. The project’s innovative interventions, both financially and non-financially, such as the production of clay handwashing kits, the manufacture of antiseptic soaps and hydroalcoholic gels based on natural plants, and the implementation of a strategy for the economic empowerment of women, constitute as many catalytic actions that have already interested other partners to collaborate with the implementing agencies to ensure a certain continuity. The Central African government and its partners were encouraged to work further on the empowerment of women, and to finance other complementary initiatives.
Method of monitoring environmental and peace impacts
The evaluation method combined quantitative and qualitative approaches, including a literature review, interviews with key resource persons and field visits. The evaluation process was fully participatory, from the start-up phase through to the reporting stage, giving priority to exchanges with all the stakeholders, with minimum recourse to sampling. Indeed, even in discussion forums with the groups, there was no limit to the number of respondents, since, in general, the total target population (beneficiary women’s groups) was not too large to require sampling within the selected groups.
Quality control must be carried out continuously and rigorously throughout the implementation of the project, starting from the formulation, in order to guarantee the effectiveness of results-based management.
The attached documentation provides a detailed methodology and results of the project evaluation, including evaluation criteria, key questions, ethical considerations, limits, quality assurance mechanisms, effectiveness of achieving the project results (social cohesion, productivity and profitability, access to financial services, adaptive actions), effectiveness of the project’s coordination mechanism, sustainability of the achievements, gender equity and human rights, conflict-sensitivity, inclusion of disabled persons, and short-term impact.
Futher reading
Contact details
martine.fatime@unwomen.org