Mobilisation of the Poor – a means to Poverty Reduction? - Sida

As is evident from Table 5, with the exception of the CAP organisation in Habaraduwa that was
formed in 1978, all the others began after 1987. The mean number of small groups and members
per PO were 101 and 1180 respectively. The mean number of members per small group was 12.3.
It is important to note here that one of the POs covered by the study, namely Habaraduwa, had
moved towards de-emphasising the small group process in favour of the village-level Gami
Sanvidanaya by the time of our field visit. This is reflected in the small number of small groups
there relative to the total number of members enrolled in this PO. As will be discussed later, in
trying to increase their number of savers and borrowers other POs have also sometimes tried to
bypass the difficult and time-consuming process of forming small groups. This in turn means that
the social mobilisation process has become less important in the drive to build up the membership
of these newly formed CAP institutions.
As financial institutions POs are the newest organisations in many of the study areas. As will be
elaborated in Chapter Five, POs had several limitations as financial institutions relative to other
more established leading financial institutions in rural areas, including Samurdhi Banks, SANASA
and Sarvodaya SEEDS. One of the major strengths of POs as distinct from all other organisations
at the village level, however, was that they (POs) evolved from pre-existing small groups whose
savings and membership fees were the primary source of funds for this new organisation.
Gami Sanvidanaya (village-level federation)
The small groups within a given village were federated into village organisations (Gami
Sanvidanaya). All members of a Gami Sanvidanaya (GS) were expected to meet once a month to
discuss and plan village-level activities. Where the number of small groups in a village was too small
to form a village organisation it was common for a GS to involve small groups in two or more
neighbouring villages (as happned in Ibbagamuwa and Nagoda). Elsewhere, there were several
active small groups side-by-side in one village so they had federated into more than one GS. For
instance, in the village of Peraliya, under the Hikkaduwa PO, there were three parallel GS
organisations organising common activities among the different small groups.
Typically a GS was not a registered or statutory body but an informal entity seeking to undertake
collective operations that were too large for small groups to handle. For instance, where a GS was
involved in savings and lending activities, small group members turned to the GS for larger loans
than they could obtain from small groups (given the limited volume of savings in small groups).
Where a local PO was established as a formal financial institution, however, the financial activities
of the GS were usually transferred to the PO. As a result, the GS was more inclined to undertake
other collective activities among the poor, including collective self-help activities such as
shramadana campaigns for improving local access roads, or mobilising wider community
participation in activities such as funerals affecting member households. In one instance, a
particularly active GS ran a grocery store for the benefit of its members to protect them from the
exorbitant prices charged by local traders. On the whole, the activity level of a GS depended on the
needs and interests of local small groups on the one hand, and the extent to which the PS
organisations incorporated GS into their operations on the other.
Small group level
With the exception of one PO that recently opted to make the GS the primary unit in its
operations, the small group is the primary cell in the CAP organisational framework. As noted
earlier, in the original conception of CAP the small group was used as a means to conscientise the
poor and stimulate them into much-needed action as a prerequisite for poverty alleviation and rural
development in general. As a result of subsequent changes in CAP, the promotion of a programme
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MOBILISATION OF THE POOR – A MEANS TO POVERTY REDUCTION – Sida EVALUATION 02/08