Disclaimer:
Please be aware that the content herein has not been peer reviewed. It consists of personal reflections, insights, and learnings of the contributor(s). It may not be exhaustive, nor does it aim to be authoritative knowledge.
Title
Please provide a name for your action learning plan.
Skills Development for Herd-boys
Challenge statement
Challenge type: If you are working on multiple challenges, please indicate if this is your "big bet" or "exploratory" challenge.
Please note: we ask you to only submit a maximum of 3 challenges - 1x Big Bet, 2x Exploratory. Each challenge must be submitted individually.
BIG BET
Challenge statement: What is your challenge? (Please answer in specific terms: "Our challenge is that...”.)
Our challenge is that even with the introduction of free formal primary education in Lesotho, the herd-boy
practice has continued, keeping this affected group out of school, hence negatively impacting prospects of livelihood opportunities. Moreover, this exclusion affects not only the boys’ livelihood but also their socialization as interaction with society is limited. Herd boys are at high risk of exposure to criminal gangs
who have exploited the vulnerability of this cohort of children to lead them towards engagement in criminal activities.
Background: What is the history of your challenge? What is causing or driving it? Who is involved? How does the current situation look like? What undesired effects does it produce?
though herd boys rely on the environment for their livelihood, they have not always been good stewards of the environment. It is common for herd boys to burn pastural land with the aim of getting better and greener grass quicker. These fires destroy the rich biodiversity of the highlands, killing the natural habitats of wild animals and vegetation reproduction process to produce seedlings. Burning pastures and grazelands also contributes to serious environmental effects such as land degradation and soil erosion into river systems and dams, hence reducing the land’s productive capacity. Land degradation is also accelerated by overgrazing and poor rangeland management. Their very actions are having a negative implication their livelihood
Quantitative evidence: What (official) data sources do you have on this challenge that better exemplifies the importance and urgency of this frontier challenge? You can add text, a link, or a picture.
There is an estimate of around 30,000 herd boys in Lesotho. The cultural practice in the mountains and highlands of Lesotho has always been to use a male child family member or to hire one to look after livestock, given rise to herd boys. According to Commonwealth Education Partnerships (2007) , this practice is associated with the tradition that wealth is measured in terms of the number of livestock a family has. These cultural aspects make it difficult for some male child in rural areas to access education, social services, and proper health care. The life of a herd boy requires long stretches of time in the hills and mountains looking after the flock as they graze and protecting the herd from wild animals. During this time, the herd boys are away from their families with only other herd boys as company.
Qualitative evidence: What weak signals have you recently spotted that characterizes its urgency? Please provide qualitative information that better exemplifies the importance and urgency of this frontier challenge. You can add text, a link, or a picture.
With a population of about two million, there are four ecological zones, namely the lowlands, foothills, mountains, and Senqu River Valley. These zones differ in terms of topography, altitude, climate,
number of people and population concentration. The mountain ecological zone, although a larger land area, is characterized by harsh and long winters, cool and short summers. It is in the heart of the difficult ecological zones of the country that livestock ownership is high, and it is where the herd boys are
mostly found. A large fraction of this area hosts the cattle posts (motebo) where the herd boys spent months looking after livestock without going home.
Value proposition: What added value or unique value proposition is your Accelerator Lab bringing to solving this challenge? Why is it your Lab that needs to work on this challenge and not other actors within UNDP, other stakeholders in the country respectively? Why is it worth investing resources to this challenge?
the AccLab intends to implement an experiment to provide crafts up-skilling and linkages to market for herd-boys to address a multifaceted and coherent approach to improve livelihoods; establish good relationship
between herd-boys and tourists; and contribute to alleviate social ills and improve overall human security. The experiment will aim to facilitate earning of livelihoods from crafts made of natural plants and will change herd-boys behaviour towards environment protection, thereby improving their co-existence with the ecosystem. This initiative has been inspired by the concepts of the Lesotho Highlands Development Authority’s Makhangoa community beneficiation and the South African Wow Zulu sustainable tourism models.
Short “tweet” summary: We would like to tweet what you are working on, can you summarize your challenge in a maximum of 280 characters?
The Lesotho AccLab is creating an ecosystem dependency to improve livelihoods,
human security and environmental protection among herd-boys
Partners
Who are your top 5 partners for this challenge? Please submit from MOST to LEAST important and state Name, Sector and a brief description of the (intended) collaboration.
Please state the name of the partner:
Ministry of Education and Training,
Lesotho Highlands Development Authority,
Lesotho Tourism Development Corporation,
Ministry of Trade, Industries, Business Development and Tourism
Sentebale
What sector does our partner belong to?
Government (&related)
Please provide a brief description of the collaboration.
To provide expertise, co-financing, solution inheritance for scaling and sustainability
Is this a new and unusual partner for UNDP?
No
Learning questions
Learning question: What is your learning question for this challenge? What do you need to know or understand to work on your challenge statement?
The hypothesis is that herd-boys will value the natural resources and see it not only as animal feed; but also as diversified livelihoods creation resource to be sustainably utilized. This will also reduce the uncontrolled burning of the pastures and encourage their protection. They would also value both domestic and international tourists and see them as their market for the crafts
To what stage(s) in the learning cycle does your learning question relate?
Explore, Test, Grow
Usage of methods: Relating to your choice above, how will you use your methods & tools for this learning question? What value do these add in answering your learning question?
The approach is based on robust stakeholder engagement to harvest more intelligence for co-creation and all encompassing community participation.
Existing data gaps: Relating to your choice above, what existing gaps in data or information do these new sources of data addressing? What value do these add in answering your learning question?
Not enough data to provide evidence. Current information only based on knowledge.
Closing
Early leads to grow: Think about the possible grow phase for this challenge - who might benefit from your work on this challenge or who might be the champions in your country that you should inform or collaborate with early on to help you grow this challenge?
The community leadership structures will benefit more on the natural resources governance for livelihoods equality among males and females in Lesotho. The herd-boys will further gain more sustained livelihoods.
END OF ACTION LEARNING PLAN: Thank you! The form saves automatically and your submission has been recorded. You may now exit this window.
1No poverty
8Decent work and economic growth
10Reduced innequalities
15Life on land
