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This paper is about a process and practice which is bringing representatives of tribal communities in three Indian states together with district, state and national government officials, around the issue of aquaculture services provision. The project comprises a series of visits, fieldwork, workshops, case studies, a consensus-building process, literature research and documentation. Among its aims are building shared understandings of government services provision among recipients, implementers and policy-makers, and facilitating an equitable dialogue towards policy change.

The workshop objectives were to understand a process for transacting institutional and policy change, provide feedback to “finalise” six case studies which document experiences of rural aquaculture services provision from the perspectives of representative recipient and provider groups, to review emerging “indicators of progress” to feed into a consensus-building process and to provide input into a subsequent Policy Review Workshop. It contributed to giving people a voice in policy-making processes that have an impact on their livelihoods.

There are many “stakeholders” involved in the development of schemes to support tribal people to undertake aquaculture. These should include tribal people, researchers, policy-makers and others. Stakeholders often face a situation in which different people have conflicting views. Such differences can be over the appropriate goals of a scheme, the types of outcomes, who should be helped and in what way, or the merit and worth of particular activities.

The six case studies published here grew in concept and content throughout the Project period. To follow the progress of the Case Studies, excerpts have been taken from previous Project documents, and adapted for the purpose of showing how they changed from an initial idea to the form in which they appear here and were presented finally at the Policy Review Workshop in Noida, Delhi, in April 2003. Each of the studies is different in focus and format. 

The aim of the Policy Review Workshop, as with all project activities, was “contributing to ‘giving people a voice’ in policy-making processes that have an impact on their livelihoods”. The workshop objectives included: Through six case studies, stakeholder statements and a street-play, understand the experiences of rural aquaculture services provision from the perspectives of recipients and providers; review the process for transacting policy change and lessons learnt; and make recommendations for policy change based on project outcomes.