Engaging Pacific Island Communities in Participatory Research to Improve Pig Waste Management

Ramsay G¹, Atkins D¹ and Gibson L²*

1. University of Western Sydney, Penrith, NSW, Australia
2. Forum Secretariat Pacific International, Suva, Fiji

Development projects work with changing the activities of people to meet certain ends. The ends can be defined in various ways with those ends often relating to the culture and training of those establishing the ends. When working with communities to establish goals and working to assist communities to develop appropriate outcomes it is useful to understand how decisions to change are made including cultural and learning components.

Pig waste management is a serious environmental health problem in the Pacific Islands of Fiji, Tonga, Kiribati and Tuvalu. Pig management practices have led to contaminated water and in same cases affected human health. In many cases communities have not acted to reduce this impact.

A project has been conducted to address this problem using participatory research. The outcomes for Pacific Island communities have been improvements in waste management and pig husbandry and an awareness of the link between environmental problems and health issues.

This paper outlines the research processes and reports research outcomes. Emphasis is placed on processes for understanding and learning within communities as well as relationships between community and scientific knowledge in relation to change processes. A major outcome of the project for researchers and coordinators has been significant learning on how to work with Pacific Island communities. These findings are particularly relevant because of the limited information available in the area.