Combined Methods Case Study. Rwanda PSIA: Tea sector reform

A number of key partners for the PSIA were identified and involved in the design and preparation of the analysis. These partners subsequently made up the PSIA Steering Committee that identified the local consultants. Following the creation of the PSIA team an operational design for the Stakeholder and Institutional Analysis was completed. The design outlined the fieldwork and outputs to be achieved. Consultations were based on Participatory Rural Appraisal methods and involved both focus groups sessions and open-ended interviews with key informants. Stakeholders were consulted at all levels from grassroots production to national policy level. The fieldwork where all the identified tea estates were visited formed part of the analytical basis for the Stakeholder and Institutional Analysis.

The study sequenced methods by using qualitative tools to generate data that informed the design of the baseline survey for the quantitative analysis. A literature review based on secondary information was used to go through existing research and identify sector structures and key issues. The social tools, stakeholder and institutional analysis, assessed the relevant actors and agencies within the sector, and the transmission channels through which they were affected. The institutional analysis was used to supply a detailed understanding of the institutional and contractual structure of the tea sector, and the formal and informal rules and the constraints and incentives.

The stakeholder analysis aimed to identify and understand through profiling, all the actors within the sector, including those that can affect the reform, and those that are both negatively and positively affected by the reform. The stakeholder analysis for each identified stakeholder was based on four pillars: (i) influence over the reform (ii) level of support for reform (iii) participation in reform (iv) likely impact of reform. The key stakeholder covered producer groups and organizations, wage laborers, factory and plantation owners and managers, investors, government agencies and institutions, NGOs and donors. 

The specific objectives of the institutional analysis were to (i) illustrate the formal and informal rules of the tea sector, and the norms and practices concerning production, transport, processing and sale of tea (ii) identify the transmission channels through which the constraints and incentives to tea production are channeled will impact on the stakeholders. The Institutional mapping was based on a static mapping exercise and a process mapping exercise, as described below.

• The static mapping illustrated the structure of the estates, the balance between the state-owned institutions and the private ones, and how the growers, cooperatives, and bloc industriels supplied the factories. It highlighted the importance of the growers who provide two-thirds of tealeaves and how they interact with each estate.
• The Process Mapping identified the formal and informal rules and regulations within the tea sector. It related resources to activities and highlighted constraints, bottlenecks and incentives within tea production. The process mapping was carried out for two factories, Pfunda and Mulindi - one directly involved in tea cultivation and one that is dependent on independent cultivators.

The Stakeholder and Institutional Analysis produced many findings a few of which have been outlined below:

• The focus of the analysis should be on the laborers, the pluckers, the growers and their households. The poorest and most vulnerable of these are the laborers who carry out unskilled work and are likely to receive the lowest income in the sector.
• The indirect effects of the reform on other households within the region, who are not dependent on tea, are also important. In Rwanda, the poorest households are not likely to be working in the tea sector; their main source of income is usually from employment as wage labor for neighboring households.
• A key area of importance is the growers' organizations. Growers' associations and cooperatives provide the only means possible for growers to take advantage of benefits by creating a collective forum by which the growers can exploit their committee positions post-privatization and assert their entitlements. However, many of the organizations are inexperienced, under-funded and poorly organized and supported. There is a risk that their rights within the sector could be bypassed after privatization if they are unable to assert them, or are insufficiently aware of them.
• Strategies to increase information flows, regarding prices, wages, yields, input use etc., to grower level will be crucial as will developing and improving information systems for increasing the capacity of the growers' organizations.

The analyses led to information of the social risks both to and from various options for privatization as well as an identification of the constraints and incentives to competition and liberalization of a well-functioning tea market. The findings from the qualitative tools are planned to feed into the design and execution of a baseline and follow-up household survey, using ex-ante and ex-post data to estimate the impact of privatization on the welfare indicators of different social groups, including households both dependent and not dependent on tea.

 

 

 

 

Poverty Analysis Monitoring Team, DFID and Social Development Department, World Bank