United Nations Public Service Awards Case Studies

Rugarama sector like any other sector in the country is the basis of development in the district, the base for service delivery. Located in the northern region of the country bordering Uganda, it is a rural sector but situated on the main road from musanze town to the border of Uganda. Rugarama’s strategic positioning gives it a commercial advantage over other sectors. However, the contrary was true because its small trading center was devastated and almost uninhabitable.

When the Executive secretary was appointed to this place, he realised that the leadership of the sector and the district could not solve the problems of this sector without the intervention of the community. Therefore he decided to invite a few people to discuss with them about their sector development and the problems faced. After these consultations, they then decided to form a task force which was then termed as a Joint Action Forum of the sector, quite different from JADF at the district level was constituted by the local residents of Rugarama sector without the intervention of donors or other development partners. They categorised the problems into Health, Education and Economic and divided the forum into three syndicates to address each of those problems accordingly.

Before the initiative, this sector had many problems related to social - economic development. For instance, the nearest health centre was located at least in 15 Kilometres; the residents had to walk those kilometres to get medical care regardless of situation whether simple or critical. In line with this, in the trading center there were no public toilets, urinals and even the private ones that existed were in very bad conditions which threatened to lead to health hazards.

In the entire sector, there was no single nursery school/ kindergarten and no secondary school either. The toddlers used to have their classes under a tree or those that were lucky to use a church for their classes. Those that qualified for secondary school went to far away boarding schools, the ones that could not afford, would walk very long distances or drop out of school.

The economic base of the sector was largely dependent on agriculture but the yield was always poor due to poor methods and planning. Farmers grew everything they thought they needed on their small farms.

What is the initiative about? (the solution)
Key benefits from the initiative are numerous but some of them are: The syndicate in charge of health initiated and constructed a health post whereby the community now gets medical care for curative diseases and family planning consultations. Women attending Family planning clinics increased from 150 to 400 women per month. The adhesion to medical insurance (Mutuelle de sante) was previously a problem but after the construction of the health center, adhesion rose from 50% up to96% participation. In the sector and in the trading center, hygiene greatly improved after the construction of public toilets which are managed by a private association which maintains the cleanliness of the toilets. The syndicate for Education initiated the construction of a nursery school in all cells that make up the sector. This is solely done by the community (parents). They also have finished architectural studies and have started the construction and they expect to have an inauguration in January 2008 for the secondary school. In order to have proper plan and yield for their agriculture produce, the syndicate in charge of economic affairs convinced the farmers to form an association which they named “KOIKIRU”. The association set strategies to practice modern methods of farming in which they agreed to consolidate land, multiply selected seeds for Irish potatoes and they have collected 5,000,000 Frw and 20 tones of Irish seeds. The leadership of the sector uses these syndicates to make community campaigns for a given policy that has to be implemented at the grassroots level. When there is a new policy the executive secretary invites the JAF and explains to them what it is all about and then identifies which syndicate addresses and once this is done, the JAF takes it upon itself to explain to the community.

Who proposed the solution, who implemented it and who were the stakeholders?
The executive secretary in collaboration with opinion leaders and private entrepreneurs of Rugarama sector proposed the solution of establishing a Joint Action Forum (J.A.F) through which all matters concerning social, economic and development would be addressed. The Forum was established and three syndicates were formed. 1st syndicate: in charge of health care 2nd syndicate: in charge of education 3rd syndicate: in charge of economy and development. The implementation of this initiative was pioneered by the three syndicates with the help of the community (residents of the sector), who are the key implementers of the initiative. UNICEF contributed in the implementation of this initiative by constructing ECOSUN (Public) toilets in the sector.

Describe how and when the initiative was implemented by answering these questions
a. What were the strategies used to implement the initiative? In no more than 500 words, provide a summary of the main objectives and strategies of the initiative, how they were established and by whom.
The main strategies for implementing the initiative: The sector leadership called upon opinion leaders and local entrepreneurs) of Rugarama sector and convinced them that they are the ones with the solutions to the problems in their sector. Buying into the idea they established a Joint Action Forum. This forum together with the leadership of the sector analysed the problems that are in their sector and then they decided to form three syndicates to address the various problems that they had also grouped into three categories. Each syndicate was put under the leadership of someone believed to have some expertise in that domain, for example the one for education is chaired by a teacher, that of Economic development is chaired by a renowned entrepreneur in the sector and like wise for the one in charge of health. Each syndicate made arrangements, to meet residents together with the community, they committed themselves to find resources. They first identified amongst themselves people who have different expertise, so as not to hire and this was to be regarded as their contribution in fixing the problem. For example masons, carpenters, steel fixers contributed in the construction exercise. The chairpersons of the three syndicates, JAF coordination committee and the sector’s leadership formed a team that is in charge of planning, monitoring and evaluation of the different programs. The main objective for this initiative is to mobilise and solicit support from the community in order to make Rugarama sector not only habitable but enviable for its service delivery to the community. Another objective is to show the community that with their own resources and efforts and human) they can transform their livelihood, socially and economically.

b. What were the key development and implementation steps and the chronology? No more than 500 words
There are number of key developments and they are shown below in their chronological order: On March 6, 2007 the Joint Action Forum was established under which three syndicates were also formed. On April 1, 2007 the syndicate in charge of health started its work by forming hygiene associations such as: GIRISUKU, TURENGERUBUZIM and RECBU to address the problem of hygiene and sanitation and at the same time looking for a health post in Rugarama sector. They decided to use one of the building that was being used by the cell for the health post and only rehabilitated it. In line with this, on June 30, 2007 with the help of UNICEF public toilets were inaugurated. In May 2007 nursery schools were constructed, today they are in the finishing phase. In June 2007, a master plan for secondary school was made and today, the school is under construction. On September 26, 2007 Rugarama health post was officially inaugurated by the District Mayor.

c. What were the main obstacles encountered? How were they overcome? No more than 500 words
The main obstacle encountered was the perception of the community. For they traditionally believed in the government doing it all. This was overcome by using the syndicates to sensitize the community to be the source of solution to their own problems. Finding qualified technicians in different domains were another big challenge that was encountered but with convening meetings with the community they identified among themselves some technicians who helped in the construction work that was required.

d. What resources were used for the initiative and what were its key benefits? In no more than 500 words, specify what were the financial, technical and human resources’ costs associated with this initiative. Describe how resources were mobilized
The resources used for this initiative is estimated to be around 13.000.000 RWF($23.636) and this sums up all the financial, technical and human resources’ cost for this initiative. This was used in the construction of the nursery schools, toilets, architectural studies, rehabilitating the health post and the contributions for cooperative members. The resources were mobilised from the community and the support from UNICEF. The syndicate in charge of health in collaboration with the sector leadership solicited support from UNICEF to put up public toilets, other resources comes from the contributions of the community.

Is the initiative sustainable and transferable?
The initiative is sustainable because it was conceived and implemented by the beneficiaries themselves and in terms of institutional sustainability there is JAF and the three syndicates. In addition, financial sustainability is also assured since the biggest part comes from the contributions of the community. The initiative is transferable because the core resource of the initiative is labour, community perception and involvement.

What are the impact of your initiative and the lessons learned?
There are many lessons learned from this initiative, below are the main ones; Community participation derives from the art of sensitizing them of the gains more than the required to investment (Cost- benefit ratio) Quick wins in development come with exploiting the community abundant resource- labour and basing on this to mobilise capital investments. People go to greater heights where they are inspired by results and to achieve this visionary leadership is very important. The key lesson is that with people involvement, participation and ownership of the development agenda, development is possible with minimum capital investment and outside support. We also realised that participatory planning, budgeting, monitoring and evaluation leads to a spirit of ownership of development programs and hence their sustainability. The leadership of Rugarama sector acknowledged the power that lies in coming closer to the people and ascertain that leadership however good it may be without the efforts of the population they can not achieve much. In line with this, we leaned that policies and programs are resisted by the community when they do not clearly understand the benefits.


Institution Name:		RUGARAMA SECTOR
Institution Type:		Government Agency
Contact Person:		Faustin KAYITSINGA
Title:		Executive Secretary
Telephone/ Fax:		+250 08429704
Institution's / Project's Website:
E-mail:		bureradistrict@minaloc.gov.rw
Address:		BURERA District / RUGARAMA Sector
Postal Code:		B.P 106
City:		MUSANZE
State/Province:		Northern Province
Country:		Rwanda

The Problem

Solution and Key Benefits

Actors and Stakeholders

(a) Strategies

(b) Implementation

(c) Overcoming Obstacles

(d) Use of Resources

Sustainability and Transferability

Lessons Learned

Contact Information