Module 3: Towards an application of livelihood approaches
3.5: The Livelihood Focus in PCM Programme Cycle Management
A Livelihood Focus for Cooperation Strategies and Programme Cycle Management (PCM)
The Cooperation Strategies (CS) of SDC define the medium-term frame and orientations for SDC's bilateral support in the respective country or region. They are analytical and strategic documents that make reference to SDC's mandate on poverty reduction and build upon SDC's experiences. Geographic areas, partners, and alliances as well as thematic priorities are defined in these documents.
Coherence between development support on livelihoods and on policy levels is a key requirement for SDC's Cooperation Strategies. The Sustainable Livelihoods Approach (SLA) promotes such integrated thinking. The SLA provides conceptual links between micro and macro levels of development programmes (see Doc 1.1) and contributes to a poverty-relevant programme outcome. Thus, the SLA offers a reference frame
- for analysing the context factors of livelihood systems, such as vulnerabilities and opportunities as well as the roles and influences of policies, institutions, and processes on poor people's livelihoods
- for identifying vulnerable groups, for analysing their endowment with assets, their strengths, and their requirements for development support
- for formulating hypotheses on livelihood outcomes and on the role and relevance of transforming institutions.
The underlying principles of the SLA (see Doc 1.4) apply to the Cooperation Strategies of SDC as well. The SLA facilitates investigation and monitoring of the interface between policies, institutions, processes, and structures on one hand, and the livelihood strategies and outcomes on the other throughout the entire Programme Cycle Management (PCM), as illustrated in the previous page. At the planning stage, it facilitates the identification and validation of alternative entry points in the context and core of livelihoods for effective poverty reduction measures (Compare Doc. 3.4). Moreover, it offers a useful framework for a quick assessment of poverty relevance, the guiding impact hypotheses, and the intervention logic at the level of a Cooperation Strategy. Finally, the SLA provides a useful framework for setting monitoring priorities, or in short, for tracking development-induced changes in poor people's livelihoods.
