The Tool
The participatory development plan (PDP) or Community Development Plan (CDP) is the outcome of the planning process. It constitutes of the communities priorities, opportunities available, resources needed and plan of action. The PDP is community owned document that the community can us to mobilize its own resources and also search for willing partner who con support them meet their priorities.
How to apply
The community development plan is development through Focused Group Discussion where community members involved in generating data using the previous tools sit together and reflect on how the resources they have can been used to solve the problems/needs identified. In practice this is done through a series of reflective questions by the facilitator. This could include:
- what are our needs as documented through the previous participatory tools?
- what resources do we have to cater for those needs?
- what do we need from outside?
- who can help us get it?
- within what time frame?
The answers to these questions are documented in tabular form which is the actual community development plan. The plan can now be used by the community to mobilize their own resources to meet their needs/priorities and to solicit for external help where necesary. A sample community development plan is shown below:
The output - an example
