R O M E F E B R U A RY 1 9 - 2 1 , 2 0 1 3

SUMMARY OF THE EXPERT CONSULTATION ON MEASURING

RESILIENCE

TANGO International, April 2013

WHY AN EXPERT CONSULTATION?

Given: • Heavy focus on resilience in development sector • Lack of consensus on measurement approach

Goals of consultation:• Determine what types of data need to be

collected, at what scale, how often• Determine appropriate types of analysis

WHY AN EXPERT CONSULTATION?

Participants: • international NGOs (CRS, CARE, WV, Mercy Corps,

Oxfam)• UN organizations (UNICEF, WFP, FAO, IFAD)• donors (USAID, WB, EU, German government, Bill

and Melinda Gates Foundation)• universities (Tulane, University of Florence,

Cornell)• research institutes (IDS, CGIAR, ILRI)

WHY MEASURE RESILIENCE?

• Recurring crises underscored need for new approach, combining humanitarian emergency response and development goals• Need for verifiable measures to support evidence

of program impact and to inform planning/ programming

Need empirical evidence of what factors contribute to resilience, under what contexts, and for what types of shocks.

The ability of countries, communities and households to anticipate, adapt to and /or recover from the effects of potentially hazardous occurrences (natural disasters, economic instability, conflict) in a manner that protects livelihoods, accelerates and sustains recovery, and supports economic and social development

Defining Resilience

RESILIENCE PRINCIPLES

General principles for measuring resilience:

Context-specific measures resilience of a specific target (who) to a

specific shock/stress (what); context changes over time (is affected by

previous conditions/affects future conditions)

Temporal considerations panel data collected from same households over

time

RESILIENCE PRINCIPLES

Thresholds/tipping points point(s) at which changes in behavior and

performance lead to shifts (transitions) from one response trajectory to another; can be structural or transitory

Technical capacity resilience measurement should reflect inherent

complexity of concept sophisticated methods of analysis match methods to available human/financial

resources (factor analysis vs. qualitative methods)

RESILIENCE PRINCIPLES

Cultural relevance engage local stakeholders and affected

communities benchmarks for success that are locally/culturally

meaningful

Community/higher level measurement formal/informal governance and institutional

processes and systems enhance/limit individual and household resilience

policies, knowledge/ information management, laws, programming

RESILIENCE PRINCIPLES

Inter-scalar relationships inter-related hierarchy of dependencies (individual,

household, community, regional) take into account functional connections and

interactions that cause one level to influence another

Aspirations/motivations Influences preferences, choices, and behaviors of

individual, households and communities shaped by socio-cultural, gender-based and religious

attitudes and norms affects willingness to take risks (leading to improved

outcomes)

RESILIENCE PRINCIPLES

Natural resources/ecosystem health livelihoods depend on natural resources health of ecosystems important for long-term

sustainability need to measure state of health, not just physical

access

CURRENT PRACTICES

FAO Mercy CorpsWFP Oxfam GBUSAID ACCRATufts University Food Economy GroupTulane University KimetricaCRS IFADUniversity of Florence

Current efforts in measuring resilience include those by:

SUMMARY OF SIMILARITIES/DIFFERENCES IN APPROACH

• Focus on household and community characteristics of resilience regardless of the nature of the shock (e.g., Oxfam, ACCRA)

• Focus on capturing changes over time by monitoring coping/adaptive strategies in response to specific shocks (e.g., CRS, Mercy Corps)

• Focus on outcome monitoring; are well-being indicators stable/changing in relationship to shocks (e.g., HEA, WFP)

SUMMARY OF SIMILARITIES/DIFFERENCES IN APPROACH

• Use existing data (e.g., USAID, FAO, HEA, WFP)

• Few approaches include psychosocial components of resilience (e.g., Tulane, Mercy Corps)

• Very few approaches are measuring resilience at the community level or at multiple levels (e.g., IFAD, Oxfam, Mercy Corps)

• Limited use of participatory approaches to measuring resilience (e.g., Tulane)

KEY POINTS FOR MEASURING RESILIENCE

Focus of measurement Value for money, planning/programming, impact Need more analytical work on relative

costs/benefits of different interventions within different contexts

What works in one situation may not work in another; or provide the same value for money

Unit of analysis Household, community, higher systems level Household-level measurements may not capture

certain indicators (e.g., social capital)

KEY POINTS FOR MEASURING RESILIENCE

Types of measurement Subjective/objective Consultative/participatory processes Shed light on higher level factors difficult to

capture through objective measures

Data collection Assessment fatigue: too many household surveys,

too lengthy Piggy-back on on-going efforts; core set of

questions

KEY POINTS FOR MEASURING RESILIENCE

Timing/frequency of data collection Appropriateness of development timeline (3-5

years) Needs to account for longer-term processes (e.g.,

institutional, governance) Use of “lighter” questionnaires, applied more often

Qualitative approaches Enhance understanding of resilience – drivers,

constraints Use iteratively with collection of quantitative data

KEY POINTS FOR MEASURING RESILIENCE

Technical standards Need to ensure validity and reliability of resilience

measurements Care in assigning weights, identifying factors of

resilience

Harmonization of indicators Standard measures measurement principles New ways of assessing/analyzing existing

indicators

KEY POINTS FOR MEASURING RESILIENCE

Analytical framework General enough to be applied in different

contexts Flexible enough to be contextualized Measures include:

Initial well-being/basic conditions measures Disturbance measures Resilience measures End-line well-being/basic conditions measures

• Food security

• Health/ nutrition index

• Asset index

• Social capital index

• Access to services index

• Infrastructure

• Ecological/ ecosystem services index

• Psychosocial measure

• Poverty measures

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Frequency, duration, intensity of:

Covariate shocks/ stressors• Drought• Flood• Health

shocks• Political

crises• Market

prices• Trade/

policy shocks

Idiosyncratic shocks/stressors• Illness/

death• Loss of

income• Crop failure• Livestock

losses

Absorptive Capacity • Coping behavior• Risk management• Informal safety nets• Conflict mitigation• Disaster mitigation

& EWS• Savings groups

• Food security

• Health/ nutrition index

• Asset index

• Social capital index

• Access to services index

• Infrastructure

• Ecological/ ecosystem services index

• Psychosocial measure

• Poverty measure

Proposed Analytical Framework for Measuring Food Security Resilience

Indicators

Indicators

Indicators

Indicators

Adaptive Capacity• Human capital• Debt and credit• Use of assets & info• Psychosocial• Dependency ratio• Livelihood

diversification

Transformative Capacity • Governance

mechanisms• Community

networks• Protection and

security• Use of basic

services• Use of formal

safety nets• Use of markets• Use of

Infrastructure• Policies/

regulations

KEY POINTS FOR MEASURING RESILIENCE

Resilience learning Identification of what constitutes resilience within

various contexts Establishment of “resilience hubs” Tulane currently working with 20 universities

across Africa to contextualize drivers of household/ community resilience within different environments

NEXT STEPS: FACILITATED THROUGH FOOD SECURITY

INFORMATION NETWORKShort-term (within 6 months) Establish Community of Practice and Technical

Working Group Prepare and distribute workshop proceedings Agree on common analytical framework Map who is doing what and where Initiate data mining/meta-analysis Begin online consultation/facilitated dialogue

between programming and decision-makers Produce publications, briefs, etc. on results of work Call for papers as incentive to Community of Practice

NEXT STEPS: FACILITATED THROUGH FSIN

Medium-term (within 1 year) Technical Working Group to review papers and

publish Case studies, pilots, further testing of approaches

in different contexts Identification of good practices Develop guidelines for resilience measurement

(e.g., data collection, risk/trend analysis)

NEXT STEPS: FACILITATED THROUGH FSIN

Longer-term Identify set of common indicators to measure

resilience in food and nutrition security Identify new indicators to better measure

resilience Use Community of Practice to identify and share

best practices