Non-governmental organizations and natural resources management : synthesis assessment of capacity-building issues in Africa

This report assesses the effectiveness of this institution-building effort. The major finding is that while NGO capacity-building leads to improved NRM, complementary efforts are needed to achieve sustainable NRM. Other findings are as follows. (1) Unless donors, governments, service-providing NGOs, and national NGOs integrate their efforts, capacity-building achievements are likely to be ad hoc and not systemic. (2) Strategic planning for NGO capacity building should balance field work in pursuit of immediate NRM goals with pilot efforts to test innovative NRM methods. (3) NRM sustainability depends on local NGOs achieving institutional and technical credibility. International NGOs should negotiate flexible programs with donors to help local NGOs gain the hands-on experience they need to develop such credibility. This will increasingly require a posture of selective risk-taking on the part of donors. (4) NGOs and donors should be more realistic about what collaboration and partnership can and should accomplish. Some situations require significant delegation of authority to NGO partners, while others call for close planning and implementation between Northern and Southern colleagues. (5) North-South NGO relationships should be developed in stages -- from working relationships to collaborative relationships to formal partnership. (6) When entering new relationships, Northern and Southern NGOs should negotiate mutual objectives and discuss each other"s assumptions and constraints (including funding pressures). This will help avoid the recent phenomenon of "overempowerment," where Northern NGOs assume that Southern NGO implementation capacity exists if Southern colleagues can identify needs and eloquently express a vision. In this case, political correctness may be substituted for objective realities, to the detriment of all partners and to sustainable NRM as well.