PLA Notes CD-ROM 1988-2001 5 Economic classification of a community using locally generated criteria

Document begins: PLA Notes CD-ROM 1988­2001 5 Economic classification of a community using locally generated criteria Parmesh Shah We (a team of about 5 staff members of the limits they were asked to classify the rest. Aga Khan Rural Support Programme (India)) Such a classification was well understood, as conducted a five day RRA exercise in a was evident from the fair representation across Gujarat village in April last year. With a view the four categories. to classifying the economic status of the community we held meetings with individuals There are a total of 249 Ismaili families in the and with focus groups. The information village. It was from this number that we chose collected during the group meetings was then 23 household names, at random, for the first tested during subsequent discussions. group to classify. Then all the names against which there was some hesitation, debate, Two sets of interviews were held separately in doubt among the respondents in classification groups. The first one with two religious heads. were taken up to find out the criteria for Both these people were very articulate and classification. This was later followed up by knew the vast majority of households in the ...