M Sc

Social audit as a tool for evaluating development projects and has been found
to be efficient for appraising projects in various sectors like health, natural resource
management, agriculture, community development, water sanitation and hygiene, land
conservation etc.
In spite of the interventions by governments and non-governmental
organization to ensure food security, agricultural development projects in most
countries around the world had been affected with number of issues including climate
change, corruption, lack of participatory evaluation mechanism as well as poor
involvement of communities in decision making processes. The scenario is not
different in Malawi either, specifically Phalombe district which faces a number of
climate change problems like floods and droughts throughout the year.
The present study which followed expo-facto design was undertaken to assess
the effectiveness of projects on climate resilient agriculture that are implemented in
Phalombe, Malawi. The study analyzed the outcomes, constraints and impact of
selected projects and evolved a framework of social audit for evaluating such projects.
Data was analyzed using Statistical Package for Social Science (SPSS) and the results
have been presented quantitatively and descriptively. A total of 120 respondents from
three Extension Planning Areas of Tamani, Kasongo and Mpinda were purposively
selected for the study since they had participated in climate resilient agriculture
projects. The sample also included 15 staff from the three NGOs that were selected
for the study.
It was found that 96 female farmers (78.3%) and 24 males (21.7%) had
participated in the study which showed that more women were taking part in climate
resilient agriculture projects compared to men. The research also revealed that manypeople who participated in climate resilient agriculture projects were married and
most of them had education upto primary school level (84.2%). Secondary level
education was found to have been acquired by 8.3% of the total respondents. Lower
level of education was found to contribute to poor demanding of transparency and
accountability from NGOs.
Assessment of the agreement of respondents on severity of constraints showed
that Kendall’s coefficient of concordance W= 0.5, significant at 1 per cent which
proved that there was high degree of concordance among the 120 respondents in
ranking the constraints according to their importance. The major constraints identified
by the beneficiaries were: drying up of water resources, drought/ flood, small quantity
of food, late delivery of inputs and poor involvement in decision making
The results also showed that both beneficiaries and stakeholders agreed that
AEDO and AEDC, NGO staff, Village Headman, Lead farmer, VCPC, ACPC, VDC,
Community Policing, ASHP and Community Development Assistant should be part
of social audit process. The components identified for social audit of climate resilient
agriculture included training programmes, muster rolls, materials procured, input
distribution, cash distribution and funding.
Based on the study it could be proposed that all actors mentioned in the study
should be part of the process. The framework of social audit formulated as part of the
study suggested the important aspects that should be subjected to social audit. This
would help devise efficient ways of conducting social audit of climate resilient
projects in Malawi as it had been evolved through a participatory process involving
all the stakeholders of climate resilient development projects in agricultural sector.