Extention program planning. Monitoring and evaluation

Tutorial course, May 22, 2024
Extension Program Planning,
Monitoring and Evaluation
For any information:

1. The concept of planning and extension program planning
1.1. Introduction
• Planning is deciding in advance what to do and how to do.
• It is one of the basic managerial functions.
• Planning is a process by which managers’ set objectives, assess the future
and develop courses of actions to achieve those objectives.
 Planning is a continuous process, which involves making decision about
alternative ways of using available resources with the aim of achieving a
particular objective in the future.
 it is the process that leads to the establishment of goals and objectives
and the choosing of the most suitable means for achieving these goals
and objectives prior to taking action.
 Planning is one of the most important project and time management
techniques.
CHAPTER ONE
Terry and Franklin, 1991; Conyers and Hills, 1995

The concept of planning and extension program planning…..

 Extension program ,thus includes a statement of situation, objectives, problems and
solutions.
• What is the agricultural extension program in Ethiopia?
• Its main objective is to transform Ethiopia's agriculture, from a the subsistence
agricultural production to a commercialization, through the implementation of a
pluralistic extension system, by providing a strong market-oriented, demand-driven
and well-functioning agricultural extension system to male, female and youth ...
• It is relatively permanent but requires constant revision, and it forms the basis for extension plans.
• An "extension programme" is the sum total of all the activities and undertakings of a country extension
services.
• It includes: (i) programme planning process;
(ii) written programme statement;
(iii) plan of work;
(iv) programme execution;
(v) results; and
(vi) evaluation.
Kelsey and Hearne, 1949; Lawrence, 1962

 Objectives are expressions of the ends towards which our efforts are
directed.
• They are narrower than the goals set by an organization.
• For instance, the organization may have set an objective of increasing
Teff production by a quintal/hectare by the end of the current year.
• In short, we can say that the objectives which we develop after situation
analysis may range from general to specific.
 Goal is the distance in any given direction one expects to go during a
given period of time. It is broader than objective.
• For example, an extension organization may have set a goal of
increasing teff production by ten quintals in a program period of five
years.
• In this case it refer to overall gain through achievement of several
objectives of program.

 Aim is a generalized and broad statement of direction with respect to
given activities. It is broader than goals and objectives.
• For instance, the aim of a program may be to improve the economic
conditions of the farmers in its operational area.
 Mission is a reflection to the final destination where the organization
wishes to reach.
• The mission can only be succeeded if the aims and goals and long term
cherished objectives of the organization are achieved.
• For instance, the mission of District Agriculture and Rural Development
may be to make the country self sufficient in food production.
 Vision is how do you dream the innovation and rural development will
be in the mid or long-term
• For any new start up, formulate the vision statement first and it will
guide the mission statement and the rest of the strategic plan

1.2. Types of Planning in Extension
• There are three main types of plans that a manager will use in his or her
pursuit of company goals, which include operational, tactical and
strategic.
• Operational plans are necessary to attain tactical plans and tactical plans
lead to the achievement of strategic plans.
1. Strategic Plans: are designed with the entire organization in mind and
begin with an organization's mission.
• Top-level managers, such as presidents, will design and execute strategic
plans to paint a picture of the desired future and long-term goals of the
organization.
• Essentially, strategic plans look ahead to where the organization wants to
be in three, five, even ten years.
• Strategic plans, provided by top-level managers, serve as the framework
for lower-level planning.

2. Tactical Plans: support strategic plans by translating them into specific
plans relevant to a distinct area of the organization.
• Tactical plans are concerned with the responsibility and functionality of
lower-level departments to fulfill their parts of the strategic plan.
• Short range defined as a period of time extending only about one year
or less into the future.
3. Operational Plans: Operational plans sit at the bottom; they are the plans
that are made by frontline, or low-level, managers.
• All operational plans are focused on the specific procedures and
processes that occur within the lowest levels of the organization.
• Managers must plan the routine tasks of the department using a high
level of detail.
• Planning has no meaning unless it contributes to the achievement of
predetermined organizational objectives/goals/aims.

Nature of Planning
• Planning may have either top down, bottom up or participatory nature
Top down planning
• This is the planning approach where only the professionals and/or top
officials in an organization are involved in the planning process.
• Under this planning approach, the top officials believes that they
know better what is good for the program beneficiaries than the
beneficiaries or the residents of the community themselves
• This planning approach believe that that this top down planning
approach is being followed by those planners who are unwilling to
share their decision making powers with the development clientele
or the beneficiaries of development initiatives.

Extention program planning. Monitoring and evaluation

Bottom up Planning
• A type of planning approach where only the development program
beneficiaries or the people at the lower levels in the organization are
allowed to be involved in the program planning process.
• The approach believe that for any development program to succeed,
the need, values, abilities, priorities and the aspirations of the
program beneficiaries must be considered and treated as important
components.
• Their involvement in the planning process enhances the strengths of
the community by giving the individuals with in it, an opportunity to
shape their future.
• The people own expert knowledge of their own area is the best
resource for development, rather than relying solely on outside people
and their skills.

Participatory (Hybrid) planning
• This planning approach that combines both the top down and bottom up
approaches to the planning process.
• It requires the involvement of all the organizations stakeholders including
government officials, private sector, NGOs, Community Based Organizations
(CBOs), traditional leaders, community representatives etc.
• Participatory or hybrid approach is based on the premise that involvement of the
people alone in the development planning process can not achieve much without
the support of organized institutions within and outside their communities.
• Because of the limitations of the other two approaches, the hybrid approach
reconciles the needs, aspirations, and priorities of the government and/or
officials, the nation and that of the people to benefit from the development
interventions.
• Most of the methods and tools are inexpensive and simple to use and many have
been designed for use with or by community members and do not require literacy.

• The benefits of participatory development planning include (adapted from
CIFOR-2007 and IDS Resources):
• Strengthened voice: Participatory planning processes can give people,
particularly the poor and marginalized sectors of the population,
• Better informed plans:
• Strengthened capacity of citizens:
• Strengthened capacity of governments:
• Better understanding: By working together, different stakeholder groups can
develop mutual understanding and trust among themselves and can learn how to
collaborate on any follow-up activities and any future joint initiatives;
• Enhanced transparency and accountability: and
• Strengthened democracy: Participatory development planning can create
processes that are more democratic and equitable, enabling the citizens to share
decision-making power with their locally elected representatives and other
external agencies.

1.3. Major steps in Planning
Step 1: Establish Goals and Objectives (Where do we want to go?)
• Planning begins with establishing organizational goals and objectives
that contribute to the attainment of the overall goals.
Step 2: Define the Present Situation (Where are we now?)
• An important part of defining the present situation when planning for
productivity improvement is to measure the current job
performance.
• In here, measuring both success (what people have done right) and
failure (what people have done wrong) should be taken into account.
• Planning experts sometimes categorize the present situation into (a)
internal capabilities of the organization and (b) external threats and
opportunities.

Step 3: Forecast Aids and Barriers to Goals and Objectives
• This stage is an extension into the future of step 2 and can be
considered part of the same step.
• As much relevant data as feasible is gathered to make an educated
guess as to which internal and external factors will foster or hinder
organizational performance.
Step 4: Develop Action Plans for Reaching Goals and Objectives (How
are we going to get there?)
• At this critical step of the planning process, management develops a
large number of plans for reaching program goals and objectives.
• Every step taken in a productivity-improvement program needs to
be a plan of action to accomplish a program goal or objective.

Step 5: Implement the Plan
• The action plans developed in
the previous step must be put
into action if they are to
benefit the organization.
• A criticism of many planning
efforts is that the plans are
appealing but never put to
action.
• Planning without
implementation would be
much like fantasizing about
an exotic vacation but never
leaving home.

Step 6: Control the Plan (How will we know we are getting there?)
• Few programs ever proceed exactly as planned while some plans are
totally unworkable and some have things to be modified.
• Part of the controlling process is to evaluate how well goals are being
met.
• When actual performance deviates from plan, corrective action may have
to be taken.
• If there is a huge gap between the actual performance and the plan
(major deviation), in most cases, there may be a need to reconsider and
revise the plan itself, especially if it is identified that the deviation is due
to impracticable/unworkable/overambitious plan.
• If there is a slight difference between the actual performance and the
plan (minor deviation), in most cases, such deviation can be corrected
by modifying the plan of action and taking corrective measures in
implementation.

1.4. Benefits of Planning
(A) Co-coordinated Sense of Direction
• Managers who plan can visualize their long- and short-term objectives and
gain a co-coordinated sense of direction.
(B) Managerial Perspective
• One of the advantages of broad perspective planning is that it helps
management see the need for setting multiple objectives.
• Failure to seek multiple objectives may lead to failure of the entire
organization.
(C) Improved Decision-Making
• Planning is a decision-making process.
• The decisions that are made about the organization’s objectives and the
means of reaching them provide the guidelines for making subsequent
decisions.

(D) Increased Efficiency
• The implementation decisions are concerned with efficiency – with
economy in the use of the resources to achieve valued objectives.
• Without sense of direction, managers and workers waste time,
money, and emotional involvement in bad starts and aimless
activities.
(E) Improved Control
• From first-line supervisors to presidents, a major responsibility of
managers is to maintain control – to establish clear standards or
expectations, to devise methods for knowing when standards have not
been met, and then to take whatever corrective action necessary to get
back on course.

(F) Improved Performance
• The ultimate test of whether planning is beneficial or not is whether it
improves performance or not.
• There are evidences that organizations that engage in long-range
planning perform better than those that do not.
(G) Improved Image
• In today’s competitive environment, image sometimes plays an
important role in an organization's success.
• Planning is very important to come up with a unified image of an
organization.

Shortcomings of Planning
 Planning is limited by the accuracy of information and future facts
– the usefulness of the plan is affected by both the current and
subsequent correctness of the premises made, as manager cannot
predict completely and accurately the events of the future.
 Planning costs too much
– some argue that the cost of planning work exceeds its actual
contribution.
 Planning, sometimes, may contribute for delay of some sudden and
urgent actions that may have a negative impact on the performance of
an enterprise.
 Planning suppresses initiative
– because planning forces the manager into a rigid mode of executing
their work and these rigidities may tend to make the managerial work
more difficult than it needed to be.

1.5 Meaning and Principles of Extension Program Planning
1.5.1 Meaning of extension program planning
a. Extension program
• answers the questions “What is to be done? Why it is to be done?
and To whom it is to be done?.
• According to USDA Extension Programme includes a statement of:
- The situation in which the people are located;
- The problems that are a part of the local situation;
- The objectives of the local people in relation to those problems; &
- The recommendations or solutions to reach these objectives.
• The extension program is defined as a written statement of situation,
objectives, problems and solutions, which have been prepared, based on an
adequate and systematic planning effort that forms the basis in the
implementation of the program to solve specific problems in a specific area.

b. Extension planning
• Extension philosophy strongly stress the importance of extending scientific
and technological know how that will help people to solve their problems.
• This fact dictates that, some sort of priorities should be set on the problems,
objectives and the allocation of resources so that optimum aid in terms of
kind or idea can be provided to help people to solve their problems and to
achieve the overall objectives of the people in the given area.
• Moreover, the word extension also dictates the involvement of people in the
process of planning.
• Extension planning can be defined as a conscious interactive process
involving extension agents, subject matter specialists and people in
identifying problems, setting objectives and extending scientific and
technological know how or solutions for the identified problems of
the people in a given area.

1.5.2 Principles of Extension Programme Planning
1. It is based on an analysis of facts of the situation
2. It selects problems based on the needs and interests of the local people:
3. It defines objectives and solution, which offer satisfaction for the rural
people
4. It has performance with flexibility
5. It has a definite plan of work
6. It involves local people and their institutions
7. It provides bases for evaluation of results
8. It is an educational, a continuous and co-ordinating processes
9. Extension is a two-way link;

2. Collecting information for extension program planning, monitoring and evaluation
2. 1. Introduction
• When we are working in development, whatever our field, we need information in
order to plan what we want to do.
• Extension programmer need their farming systems, natural resources, social structures,
local cultures, education level of the households, etc. that may help them to have good
understanding of the situation of the people and to draw a good and successful
extension program.
• This information can be collected from secondary and primary sources.
• But the basic questions which an extension agent has to asked themselves when they
are deciding on their information needs are as follows:
– What information is already available?
– What we do not know about the area where an extension program intended to plan?
– How can this unknown information be found?
– How much is it going to cost?
– How long is it going to take?
CHAPTER TWO

2.1 Acquisition and Evaluation of Secondary Data
• Secondary data refers to background information that comprises all data
already available in published or unpublished forms and could help to
describe various aspects of target groups.
• In general, the purposes of collecting secondary data are:
– to review existing information on the physical, social, economical
and political conditions of the area;
– to identify the gaps in existing information; i.e. to identify the type
and amount of information required and to be collected to plan an
effective extension program;
– to identify the existing gap between what is happening and what
should be happened or to predict the possible constraints and
under utilised opportunities;
– To save time and money
Collecting information for EPPM & E…

• However, there are some preconditions in using secondary data. These
include:
– accuracy of the data;
– reliability of the data for the project to be planned;
– adequacy of the data for the project to be planned and
– whether the data is recent or not
• But, the method to check these preconditions from published and
unpublished documents is not clear so far;
• thus most of the users of secondary data prefer to use them as a
background information as well as a supplementary information for
their primary data rather than using them for analytical and program
planning purposes.

Sources of Secondary Data
 Reference Books
 Research Institutions
 Universities
 Libraries, Library Search Engines
 Computerized Databases
 The World Wide Web
 Government Documents
 Official Statistics
 Technical Reports
 Scholarly Journals
 Trade Journals
 Review Articles

2.2 Collecting Primary Data
• Primary data is the data that can be collected directly from the target
groups and used to meet the objectives of the extension program.
• are first hand information collected from primary sources.
• Such type of data is usually more reliable because the planner has a liberty
to explain the questions to the target clients
• These types of data can be collected by using different methods of data
collection. Among these methods: Participatory and Non-participatory methods
2.2.1 Participatory Methods
2.2.2 Non-participatory methods
- Interviewing Key Informants
- Conducting group interviews
- Structured survey method

2.2.1. Participatory Methods: Participatory Rural Appraisal
What is Participatory Rural Appraisal (PRA)?
• PRA is considered as a way of learning from, and with community
members to investigate, analyse and evaluate constraints and
opportunities, and to make timely and informed decisions regarding
development projects.
• So, it is a method for:
– general analysis of specific topic or problem of the local people;
– need assessment to identify and prioritise problems and program objectives;
– feasibility studies to analyse the possible negative and positive impacts of
the program in the local area; and
– project monitoring and evaluation.

• PRA is a label given to a growing family of participatory approaches
and methods that emphasize local knowledge and enable local people
to make their own appraisal, analysis, and plans.
• The purpose of PRA is to enable development practitioners,
government officials, and local people to work together to plan
context appropriate programs.
• In PRA, data collection and analysis are undertaken by local people,
with outsiders facilitating rather than controlling.
• PRA is a particular form of qualitative research used to gain an
in-depth understanding of a community or a situation.
• The PRA is also considered a set of tools and techniques that
enable community members and researchers learn from and
with each other.

PRA is based on three pillars
 Methods.
 Behaviour and attitude.
 Sharing.
Principles of PRA approach
• Progressing learning.
• Flexibility.
• Multidisciplinary.
• Informality.
• In the community.

Specific PRA techniques
• Secondary data review.
• Direct observations.
• Ranking.
• Priority or preference ranking
• Direct Matrix Ranking.
• Transect walk.
• Diagramming.
– Examples of diagrams are village maps, transect walk results, seasonal
calendars, Venn diagrams etc.
• Local History.

2.2.2 Non Participatory Methods of data collection
a. Interviewing of Key Informants:
• The key informant is an individual who is accessible, willing to talk and has
great depth of knowledge about the environmental, economic, social, cultural
and other conditions of an area
• Key informants are not only community members but they may also informed
outsiders.
• The advantage of interviewing key informants is that very detailed information
can be gathered relatively within short period.
• Its disadvantages are,
• Generalisation may not be possible- because key informants are usually
selected purposively, their idea may not reflect the idea of the whole people.
• The findings are susceptible to biases - This could arise because of the biased
answers of the respondent or failure of the interviewer to record responses
correctly.

b. Conducting Group Interviews:
• is a method of data collection, which can be conducted by one or more
interviewers, There are two types with or without an interview guide and with
groups of varying size and composition.
• This method of data collection is useful for tapping the collective wisdom or
memory of a communityof group interviews. These are:
Community interviews (CIs)
• To which all members of the community or villages are invited for an
interview.
• It is very useful for getting extremely quick, rough and factual overview of an
area.
• are conducted on the basis of an interview guide and take the form of public
meeting.
• only small amount of discussion points will be raised in the form of questions
by the interviewers and each participant is not expected to answer all the
questions individually.

NB. In this case, an interdisciplinary teams rather than single interviewer is
more effective for data collection. Because
• Note taking is more accurate if all team members make notes and
compare their notes after wards.
• Different disciplines will complement one another in asking questions.
Focus group interviews (FGIs)
• is conducted with a small number of participants and it tends to
focus on a limited range of topics.
• Its distinguishing feature is that participants discuss ideas, issues,
insights and experiences among them selves under the guidance of the
moderator (interviewer).
• Each member is free to comment, criticise or elaborate on the views
expressed by the previous speakers.

c. Survey Method of Data Collection
• It is a method of interviewing people to collect information
in which a formal questionnaire is used as a principal
technique to gather the required information for extension
program planning.
• In this method of data collection, usually, the sample of
respondents can be selected by random sampling
techniques to represent to particular population in the
given area.
• The researcher can use also purposive or other sampling
techniques to select his or her sample cases.

Extention program planning. Monitoring and evaluation

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