Commmunity Needs Assessment For Ngaramtoni Village

INTRODUCTION
COMMUNITY NEEDS ASSISSEMENT
This project assignment on Community needs assessment for Ngaramtoni village is envisaged to involve the Ngaramtoni village Communities, which includes ordinary Citizens, village government leaders, NGOs and CBOs and business members of the Community and many other stake holders, residing inside or outside of Ngaramtoni village.
Each group or individuals mentioned above will be invited and involved in assessing various needs in terms of economic needs, environmental needs health needs as well as community assessment. The participants will also suggest relevant solutions to the needs or problems. Effectiveness in solving community needs can only be visible if the society in question is fully involved in problem or need identification, developing plans to solve the problem taking part in the implementation process and financially monitoring and evaluating results.
Many social development studies, for example O&OD PRA, has proved that better outcomes and impacts are more obvious when a community demand driven approach is applied.
This part of my project work will engage itself in participatory approach.
It should be noted that community based activities depend largely on the strength, talents, and motivation of the community members. Too often development efforts focus on the needs of a community, which puts people in a deficit frame of mind.
In order to encourage positive community images I have suggested using a community assets approach; along side of the needs approach this assignment will also identify and discuss the reliability and justification of the research methods, approach, and tools applied to carry out the Ngaramtoni community needs assessment.
Finally this part of the project work i.e community needs assessment), for Ngaramtoni village will provide results of participatory assessment.; using stress chart analysis. A part from the results, this PRA will also, come up with, the most ranked problem to be addressed during the entire period of this project work.







NGARAMTONI VILLAGE PROFILE
Ngaramtoni village is one of five villages in KIMUNYAK ward, Enaboishu division,Arusha District, Arusha Region, Tanzania. The village is located in the Western side of Mount Meru and is about 12KM out of Arusha city along the Nairobi road.
The village is divided into five sub-villages namely:-
(1) Yohannes sub-village
(2) Kaipuko sub-village
(3) Moilo sub-village
(4) Long’idu sub-village
To the large extend the village stood as a local township, which started longtime ago, estimated to be more than 100 years.
Throughout these years, the population of Ngaramtoni township community has been growing rapidly due to business opportunities, brought by abundant supply of farm produce due to favorable farming climate, influenced by the ecosystem of Mount Meru, and also because the village is located near Nairobi road and not very far from Nairobi the capital of Kenya.
More growth in population is expected in the near future as the township is expected to be up graded and attain a township status. According to MR. OLARIP MBARIO who is the village executive officer (VEO) and basing on the National census of 2002, Ngaramtoni village by then had 5,897 adults people and 1150 children who are under 10 years of age. The village is administrated and governed under the laws and regulations provided by the government through the Ministry of local government under the prime Ministers office. In addition, the village has also by laws, and regulations which were instituted and agreed upon by the village executive council and passed by the village general meeting.
The village also have four committees:
(1) The planning committee
(2) The village security and defense committee
(3) The village social and well-fare committee
(4) The Land committee
All the four committees functions and report back to the village executive council. The executive committee analyzes all the reports and put decisions before taking the issues to the village general meeting for approval. The village chairperson is the chief executive of the village and aided committee. He/She chairs all the executive committee meetings, together with the village general assembly meetings.
The village executive officer is the secretary in all the meetings of the executive committee, together with the village general assembly meeting. He undertakes day to day matters in the village, including minutes writing, keeping records, and from time to time informing the government about development issues, through the District development Director. The main economic activities of the Ngaramtoni residents has been mostly business as well as subsistence farming and livestock keeping.

METHODS AND APPROACH
The community needs assessment for Ngaramtoni village has been carried out, using qualitative approach as well non-experimental method.
The qualitative participatory approach is chosen as the best option in this study, because it involves active participation, and the knowledge gained in the process can be easily translated to the community. Also the non-experimental research method has been chosen to carry out this study, because of the nature of the study, whereby the situation is highly uncontrollable.

RESEARCH TOOLS CHOSEN AND JUSTIFICATION
For the purpose of carrying out participatory need assessment for Ngaramtoni village; the following research tools has been identified:-
(i) Focus group discussion
(ii) Problem tree
(iii) Documents
(iv) Observation
(v) Interviewing
Focus group discussion:
Group discussion were organized at different times with similar types of participants to identify trends. Mental as well as health needs in the Ngaramtoni village. NB Answers for the group were representing a consensus or different opinions, not facts or specific data.
Documents
Past and present literatures as well as, official current or previous investigations reports are consulted, information’s or data obtained were supplemented with other questionnaires as one should not entirely rely on documentary information’s.
Observations
In the strict sense, observation implies the use of the eyes rather than of the ears and the voice. But in the researcher, takes trouble to get involved in the community, observing in the strict sense what is happening and supplement this by conversation, interviews and other information’s obtained using other research tools. In different occasions and in different areas observations has been carried out in Ngaramtoni village, and adequate information has been gathered.
NB. Direct, observation has a number of advantages compared to other methods. One major advantage is the accuracy of information. But despite of this major advantage ; has merit one big is its limitations for example, is when a researcher is interested in events or activity that belongs to the past; in this case, the researcher has to rely on documents, or on what people tells him.
Interviewing:-
A survey interview is a conservation between interviewer is a conservation between interviewer and respondent with purpose of obtaining certain information’s from the respondent. Interviewers has been contacted with different people in the Ngaramtoni village community, among the interviewed people are the village Government leaders, traditional leaders, Church leaders, extension workers and ordinary citizens; through the interviews varying information’s has been gathered concerning varying social economy, environmental as well as health needs in the Ngaramtoni village community.
For a successfully interviewing exercise three factors were of pre-requisite:
(i) Accessibility:- i.e if the respondent does not have the required information can not answer the questions.
(ii) Cognition:- The respondent initial willingness to cooperate and his/her subsequent decision to continue the interview. But more than that includes he/her motivation to give accurate answers; NB distorted answers are no better than no answers at all.
Problem tree:-
A problem tree was used in summarizing the Ngaramtoni village community needs assessment discussion. Problems were identified, as well as causes and effects; and arranged in a tree format.
The causes are the roots, , the problems are the trunks and the effects are the leaves of the tree. The problem, but the causes are not clearly visible. The exercise was also used to summarize and analyze solutions.
RESULTS OUT OF THE PARTICIPATORY ASSEMENT
COMMUNITY ASSESSMENT
1.1 VOLUNTEERISM:
The group of government leaders, Church leaders, traditional leaders and some of the ordinary citizens, who have been interview on whether volunteerism is increasing or declining; most of them said that volunteerism is declining. More decline in volunteerism is pronounced in the Ngaramtoni township area where business activities are taking place, and the residents are people coming from neighboring rural village of Olevolos, Kimunyak, Sambasha, Ilkiding’a, Olturument and even from other far villages like , like Kisongo Oldonyosambu and so on; these people comes and settle in Ngaramtoni township to do business, another category of residents are employed members of the society In most cases business people and employed civil servants fails to turn up for communal activities. They said that volunteerism is much more better in Ngaramtoni sub-villages where most of its people are engaged in agricultural activities.
1.2 DECISION MAKING PROCESS
When varying groups are interviewed, women groups, youth groups business people, extension workers, Church leaders and government leaders, they all confirm in most cases decision making is done democratically, and every person is allowed to participate and contribute views and ideas.
Participation in the process on decision making is evidenced by specific committees; for specific community needs. For example in Ngaramtoni Village there are four committees:
(i) The planning committee
(ii) The village security and defense committee
(iii) The village social and welfare committee
(iv) The land committee
All the four committee functions and report back the village executive council. The executive committee analyses all reports and take to the village general assembly/meeting for final approval.
1.3 LOCAL LEADERSHIP
Interviews were done through ordinary people in the village, extension workers, Church leaders, business people as well traditional leaders, asked about the quality or leadership capacity in Ngaramtoni village, and most of them are optimistic of leadership capacity, saying that most of the village leaders are standard VII level education, and very few has ordinary level Secondary education, they suggested that educated and knowledgeable leaders at village level are pre-requisite for positive economic development in the rural community.
1.4 COMMUNITY SAFETY: -
when parents are interviewed upon the security and safety of their young children; they commented that no incidents of bad acts to their children, though, in rare occasions there are reported cases of young children knocked by wreck less bicycle riders on the problem of drugs abuse alcoholism and in morality most of the people interviewed raised their concern over the growing habits of many unemployed youth engaging themselves in drugs abuse and alcoholism. They continued that if this problem is not checked, the Ngaramtoni village will turn to be the center of gangs and ultimately insecure for economic activities.
1.5 POVERTY MEASURES:-
Varying people interviewed including government leaders, Church leaders said there are government efforts to alleviate poverty, such measures include the provision of finance to organized community groups “Tajirika na Kikwete”, One billion Tshs. Extended to each region in the Country. NGOs and CBOs also provides for example SEDA, PRIDE (Tanzania), compassion international do provide loans to initiate developmental projects. The majority of young people who had no formal employment, when interviewed, they still feel that nothing is being done by the government to support them get out of poverty.
1.6 COMMUNITY NEEDS:-
A cross section of the Ngaramtoni village community has been approached and interviewed or asked to point out basic needs which are unfulfilled or completely lacking in Ngaramtoni village:- the majority of the people interviewed ranked the of water as the most pressing need, whereby, they complain that, family members especially and sometimes school children spent a lot of hour during the day searching for water, from few water points. The hours spend to look for water could have been spent in economic actictivities and contribute in poverty alleviation. Those who could not have time to go around to fetch water at a distance water point, are forced to buy twenty liters of water at 500 Tshs. The other basic need which rank second has been sited as lack of secondary school. The Ngaramtoni village people and other neighboring village (about 10 villages) rely on one Secondary school which is neither well equipped nor has enough classrooms, and teachers, to absorb a tremendous huge number of primary school children who every year qualify for Secondary education. This problem forced a good number of youth to be pushed in the community with no formal employment neither skills to enable them to engage in formal employment.
The third pressing community need for Ngaramtoni village society was sited to be inadequate health and medical services. The village depends on only one government dispensary taking consideration of the huge population of about 5,897 adults people and 1150 children basing on 2002 National census. The dispensary is also serving other more than 5 neighboring villages people interviewed said that, though there are three medical and health services offered by those private dispensaries ,but the majority of the villagers with low income can not afford the cost of medical and health services offered by private dispensaries.


1.7 COST OF LIVING:-
Varying views were given on the Cost of living. Most of the ordinary
villagers with no formal employment or business, , but depends on petty business of selling farm produce or subsistence rural farming has highly Complain that, Cost of living is very high and un favorable to them due ever increasing prices of basic Commodities for example sugar, cooking oil, soap, clothing shoes and even house rents; they blamed the government of not taking measures to control inflation. A marginal part of the Ngaramtoni population, though they blame on ever escalating inflation, but they don’t seems to feel much of the problem compared to the majority of low-income class. This minority are few Civil servant , and business people who runs Medium and big businesses.

1.8 CULTURAL ISSUES:-
When elders, and traditional leaders are visited and interviewed
regarding the present cultural aspects in the Ngaramtoni village community, both admitted and commented that cultural issues or practice, not all but same are fading out. They sited an example of female circumcision and said that most of the community members especially educated and religious families are no longer entertaining female circumcision. Elders and traditional leaders, commented on respect based on age is no longer enforced, and in a way contributed to immorality acts .Youth have varying views, though the majority of the youth seems to honor cultural aspects, but few disregard cultural aspects and, are driven by western value.
1.9 EDUCATIONAL FACILITIES:-
All community groups visited and interviewed has raised their concern about the poor state of educational facilities which are available in the area. Teachers students parents NGO’S and CBO’S representatives were interviewed and everyone narrated the poor of educational facilities in the area. They said one government secondary school with very few classrooms, few qualified teachers no laboratory and a library cannot cater for a big number of primary children who qualify every year for secondary education. Apart from having only one secondary school, there is no vocational training College or medium professional colleges. This situation led to have an ever increasing number of un employed youth in the area.
1.10 PENDING PLANS AND PROPOSALS:-
In principle the village government leadership when interviewed, do have pending plans and proposals geared towards solving some of the community needs. Some of the plans, being to improve educational facilities and water shortage problem. The villagers are motivated to contribute money to construct more classrooms in the secondary school and in some of the primary schools in the area. There are also plans to build a health center and improve the existing water system. The community respond to these initiatives as per some of the local government leaders interviewed is not impressing due to mistrust the community members have on local.
Government leadership as well as some of the NGO’S and CBO’S who are entrusted to handle the money for the projects, but at the end of the day the money is mismanaged embezzled, and zero benefit is delivered to the community.
1.11 COMMUNITY STRESS CHART


S/N
Community stress
Source of stress
Community assets
1.
Lack of volunteerism
· Declining cultural aspects – (Communal spirit)
· Economic stress people have no spare time to turn up to communal work.
· Human capital (labor)
· Social capital
· Local government by laws regulations.

2.
Lack of security
· Un controlled in immigration
· Rapid population growth towards market centers
· Illegal fire arms, guns.
· Poverty (due to unequal
· Police posts
· Night patrol (sungu-sungu)
· Community policing
· Public education
3.
Water shortage
· Unprotected catchments area
· Rapid population increase
· Lack of routine maintenance of the existing water system
* Rain water
* Protection of catchments
water sources areas.
*Public education on participatory environment at conservation (NGOs & CBOs)

4.
Lack of educational facilities.
· Rapid population increase
· Lack of volunteerism
· Lack of motivation to the teachers .
· Corrupt leaders
*Family planning education & awareness.
*Locally available construction material e.g stones, and murram.
*Human capital e.g carpenters, welders and plumbers.
5.
Lack of health facilities
*Lack of medical and health infrastructure
*Lack of medical personnel
*High cost of medical services
*Government policy
*Volunteerism
*Education on general health and Hygiene through NGOs and government.
6.
Inadequate Housing
*High cost of construction materials.
*Rapid population growth
No long-term housing plans.
*Human capacity
*Availability of stones & sand
Education on better housing.
7.
Decline in cultural values and practice.
*Western values and practices view as better than traditional values especially by the young generation.
*Government policies e.g female circumcision
*Tribal interaction neutralizes common cultures and values e.g tribal inter-manages.
*Presence of elders
*Government emphasis and support to uphold good traditional practices
8.
Lack of artistic and cultural practices
*Emphasis on Western arts e.g Bongo Beats
*Lack of support and motivation extending financial support.
*Education and advocacy of traditional arts and practices by elders and government
*Availability of local materials.
9.
Pending plans and proposals
*Delayed implementation.
*Lack of transparency and mismanagement
*Lack of volunteerism & motivation
*Lack of donors
*Availability of human labor
*Availability of social capital
*Institution of punishment for misguided leaders who embezzled projects founds.


2. ECONOMIC ASSESSMENT
2.1 ECONOMIC ACTIVITIES:-
In assessing for economic activities in Ngaramtoni village; observation and interviews are conducted to a cress-section of the population. These being ordinary people, women and men, youth and elders. Business people were also visited as well as local government leaders interviewed.
Through observation survey done; the survey identified a varying range of business as well as economic activities.
Businesses identified are:-
-Tailoring commodity shops, restaurants, carpentry, garages, saw-mills, butchers, stationeries and internet cafes, hardware’s, pharmacy shops, transportation vehicles (daladalas and lorries). During market days i.e Thursday and Sundays a big number of villagers gets into Ngaramtoni market place and sell food produce ranging from fruits and vegetables, grains and even livestock.
When interviewed on the performance and prospects of their businesses, each category comes up with their own views.
The carpentry category complains of increase in the prices of timber, this lead them to get less orders and hence less income.
The tailoring category commented on second hand clothes (Mitumba) they are getting less orders for new clothes as majority of the population goes for cheaper second hand clothes.
Sawmills, flour mills and garages owners, complains of frequent power cuts as well increase in price in power consumption commodity shop owners restaurant bars and Daladala owner are not directly affected by power cuts and increase in power consumption bills, but they express indirect economic stress brought by inflation of basic needs.
2.2 HOUSING:
Investigation is carried through focus group discussion (People renting houses) and land lords (house owners). Both groups reveal that inflation and rise in living standards as well increased demand on houses, led to increase in house rents/charges
2.3 MICROFINANCE:
Investigation carried out through focus groups (women groups & youth groups) as well individual interviewing, some micro financing institutions and NGOs are providing financial services to the group and individuals in Ngaramtoni Village. These financial institutions includes; Pride Tanzania, SEDA, SACCOS, Akiba Commercial Bank, NMB and CRDB.
However they revealed that they encountered problems in repayment due to high interest rates charged by most of the financial institutions except the SACCOS
2.4 INVESTMENT
Interviews the majority of the respondents admitted free investment in the Ngaramtoni village, with no ethnic discrimination. There is a multiethnic grouping in Ngaramtoni township an indication of free trade. Though the majority of investors are small and medium enterprises (SME), no Industries or factories.

2.5 EMPLOYMENT
This investigation is carried using questioners, and finding shows that most of the people are employed by the private sector and earn a wage less than the living wage per day, estimated to be 1 USD or Tshs. 1,200. These employees are mostly barmaids, shop attendants, house girls and casual laborers. A part from receiving the minimum wage also they have no statutory benefits. For few civil servants interviewed for example teachers and extension workers, the findings reveal that they are moderately receiving wages above minimum wages from Tsdhs. 80,000 and above. It was also evidenced that most of trained personnel do receive reasonable wages. Employment prospect in Ngaramtoni village is good, because the township is expanding and attracting more and potential investors.

2.6 BUSINESS ACTIVITIES:
This investigation is carried by interviewing of a cross section of people in Ngaramtoni business community. Many of them admitted that their businesses are challenged by poor social infrastructure, for example frequent power cuts, , insufficient water supply and absence of financial institution office’s in the area. In most cases they had to go to Arusha city for money transaction; as well as buying supplies for sell.
2.7 BUSINESS SKILLS
As interviewing being the most suitable tool here, a cross-section of business men and women were interviewed and most of respondents, openly declare that they have no any formal business training, rather they said that they opted to engage in business, because they do not have college or professional education which will offer them formal employment.

2.8 INFORMAL BUSINESSES
In this area observation, interviews and survey tools, are both used to identify and distinguish formal and informal businesses in Ngaramtoni village. It is found that 85% of the community businesses are informal .Here informal implies they do not have formalized licenses from the office of the district trade officer. The remaining 15% has formal businesses, which are formally licensed. In this case, the informal sector play a greater role to the Ngaramtoni ,community the informal sector contributes in the following ways:-
- Provide informal unemployment to the majority of community members.
- Create social stability
- Acts as entry point to formal business
- Leads to economic growth
- Creates stable market prices
- Provide market to local producers
- Improve quality of goods and services through competition

2.9 INFRASTRUCTURE:
Assessment in this area has been easily done using observation and interviews tools. The findings establish that infrastructure in Ngaramtoni village is generally poor for example there are paved road which, are less accessible during rainy season.. Social services like schools, colleges, hospitals and dispensary are quite inadequate most of the respondents commented on the needs to improve social services and infrastructure to match ever increasing population.

2.10 ECONOMIC STRESS CHART

NS/NO.
ECONOMIC STRESS
SOURCE OF STRESS
COMMUNITY ASSETS
1.
Poor performance of some of the business e.g tailoring and carpentry
*Cheap second hand clothes (Mitumba)
*Rapid increase in timber prices
*Imported ready made clothes.
*Seasonal needs of new clothing e.g Christmas.
*Reforestation to increase supply of timber
2.
Less affordable housing
*Increase in population
*High cost of construction materials
*High housing rents.
*Sourcing of a alternative cheap building materials
*Training more carpenters and manpower, this will bring labor charges low
3.
People earning minimum wages
*Low level of training
*Lack of jobs opportunities
*Lack of active labor unions
*Low level of investments.
*Prospect of big investments
*Enforcing government laws and regulation on labor and wages.
4.
Lack of macro enterprise investors
*Lack of entrepreneurship skills
*Poor infrastructure
*Inadequate local market
*Prospects and pending plans to improve infrastructure.
*Population increase will lead to demand growth.
*Availability of land for investment e.g tourism hotels.
5.
Lack of public services
*Few primary schools as well as secondary schools
*Inadequate water supply
*Lack of volunteerism
*Lack of responsible leadership.
*NGO and CBOs are supporting construction of class rooms
*Social capital through community mobilization; to volunteer and contributor resources
*Government intervention to scan irresponsible leaders.
6.
Lack of business skills
*No business colleges in the area
*NGOs and CBOs are volunteering to offer business skills
*Social groupings offer opportunity to share entrepreneurship skills.




3. ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENT

3.1 CONDITIONS OF LOCAL NATURAL RESOURCES:-
This assessment task is an condition of local natural resources in Ngaramtoni village had been conducted using observation and interviews. The investigation revealed that, no natural forest exist, because the respondents and observations could not see any natural forest around the area.
Some of the interviewed residents explain that much of the natural trees had been cut down for different purposes for example fire wood and for construction of houses and furnitures. Observations show that there are natural water sources around the area; springs and rivers; but threatened by people settlement near the water sources, as well as farming and livestock keeping

3.2 CONDITIONS OF THE LOCAL ECO-SYSTEM SERVICES
Cross-section interviews carried among varying groups; suggest that there non local eco-system services in place, as there is no harsh environmental disasters in area. In some instance crops pests are noticed, but pest sides are readily available to cub the problem. The soil is naturally fertile and if depleted, the use of organic fertilizers takes place.
3.3 NATURAL RESOURCES/ECO-SYSTEM SERVICES USED FASTER THAN REPLENISHMENT?
Most of the interviewed that natural resources like natural trees, water, land are being used faster than replenishment, due to rapid increase in population. Natural resources are static while the population and their demands continue to shoo up day after day
.
3.4 PROBLEMS
3.5 OF POLUTION
In order to establish whether there are problems of pollution, i visited and surveyed several areas in Ngaramtonias well as interviewing
various groups of people. In many places which i visited the problem of
pollution is enormous. In the market place there is a huge pile of garbage both solid waste and organic west mixed together, and one can feel the smell of rotting organic waste for-example left-overs, cabbages, potatoes and other organic waste. A part from the pile of garbage in the market place, also garbage can be seen scattered all over the places, near butchers, restaurants, residential houses, shops, saw mills, flour mills, garages, along side and inside river Ngaramtoni when one walk to any corner of Ngaramtoni township, waste solid and non-solid, is rampantly scattered all over. A part from garbage pollution; dirty water, from residential and business houses flows along the paths of Ngaramtoni. The survey also revealed that garages, saw mills, flour mills, vehicles and big trucks are other sources of pollution.

3.5 PROPER MANAGEMENT OF WASTE:
When I visited the Ngaramtoni village executive officer MR. OLARIP MBARIO in his office and interviewed him whether there are pending plans to cub the problem of waste in Ngaramtoni village; he said that, there are no sustainable plans in place right now except that they employed three personnel just to go around sweeping, cleaning; and gathering garbage in one chosen area near market place, that has been the sources of health problems e.g cholera and also bad smell.

3.6 DEPENDANCY OF LOCAL ECONOMY ON NATURAL RESOURCES AND SYSTEM
Many people who are interviewed, ranging from business people local leaders and ordinary citizens admitted that natural, resources for example catchments forest, planted forest water sources (rivers and springs) fertile soil, are very much significant for the economic prosperity of the local people in Ngaramtoni village.

3.7 LONG TERM PLANS FOR LOCAL NATURAL RESOURCES AND ECOSYSTEM
Focus groups interviewed including NGOs, CBOs, extension workers and local government officials said that efforts are being taken by NGOs, CBOs and government to protect the natural resources sustain ably , through awareness raising, environmental education in schools, local environmental committees, re-forestation, protection of water sources etc.

3.8 DEPLETED NATURAL RESOURCES WHICH WERE ONCE IN USE TO CREATE
JOBS BUT NO LONGER IN PLACE
The interviews done through focus groups reveal that, natural resources which were there in the past, can still be found, though not to the same degree or status, as most of the natural resources are diminishing, leading to less benefits or jobs.

3.9
POSSIBILITY OF REPLENISHING / RESTORING NATURAL RESOURCES
Many interviewed people suggest that efforts should be done to restore diminishing natural resources. For example the re forestation campaigns, protection of springs and water sources, soil fertility restoration and so on.

3.10 DEPLETED NATURAL RESOURCES
People interviewed, sited indigenous species of trees, and plants, which were used in the past as local herbal medicine can no longer be found in the area, due to unsustainable practices.

3.11 DEPLETED ECOSYSTEM
Ordinary local citizens approached and interviewed mentioned that some springs which were active in the past are no longer providing water due to unsustainable practices of the local people for example grazing livestock near the springs, as well as farming.
Interventions
by NGOs CBOs and government seems to restore the spoiled ecosystem.

3.12 FUTURE PROSPECT OF NATURAL RESOURCES AND ECOSYSTEM TO THE
COMING GENERATION:
The coming generation (our children) are most likely to witness in the future disappearance of Natural resources as well as ecosystem services, due to unsustainable practices of the present generation. They will find no natural species of trees and plants for herbal medicine, and hard wood and they will miss the natural springs and rivers.

3.13 ECREATIONAL ACTIVITIES WHICH ARE ASSENTIAL TO BUSINESS
When a focus group of business people interviewed they suggested and commented, football, pool table, basket ball and even jogging as essential recreation activities to their businesses, as part of refreshment after day long work.

3.14ENVIRONMENTAL ASSESSMENT STRESS CHART

S/NO.
Environmental stress
Causes of stress
Community assets
1.
Lack of natural resources
*Unsustainable practices
*Rapid usage due to population increase
*Environmental conservation awareness
*Human manpower to restore the natural resources e.g planting indigenous trees.
*NGOs and CBCOs raising awareness for sustainable practices.
2.
Diminishing eco-system services eg water from rivers and springs and soil fertility
*Unsustainable practices
*Rapid usage due to population growth.
*Environmental conservation awareness.
*Government policy to protect eco-system
*NGOs and CBOs raising awareness for conservation of eco-system
3.
Rapid depletion of natural resources and eco-system
*Rapid increase in population.
*Lack of environmental conservation awareness.
*Government policy and laws to protect natural resource and ecosystem
*NGOs and CBOs raising awareness on Environmental conservation
4.
Pollution problems
*Lack of sustainable plans to control or manage pollution
Population growth and their activities
*Lack of Environment conservation education awareness.
*Human capacity and manpower
*NGO and CBOs ready to intervene and provide both awareness and resources
5.
Economy failures due to lack of natural resources and eco-system
*Lack and adequate water
* Lack of sustainainable plans to control or manage pollution.
*Population.
*Population growth and their activities
*Lack of Environment conservation education awareness
*Human manpower to protect catchments areas
*NGOs and CBOs raising awareness

6.
Lack of long-term plans to serve local natural resources and ecosystem
*Human capacity able to develop and implement the plans.
NGOs CBOs and other holders are ready to cooperate with the local leaders and the community to develop sustainable plans.
7.
Loss of jobs due to depletion of natural resources
*Rapid population growth
*Lack of sustainable conservation of natural resources.
*Lack of awareness on sustainable environmental conservation
*Intervention of NGOs and CBO empowering local authority to develop sustainable natural resources conservation plans
*Government by laws through local authorities to protect natural resources.
8.
Lack of recreational activities essential to businesses
*No reserved sites recreation.
*Government willing to provide
*People will participate to develop





4. HEALTH NEED ASSESSMENT

4.1 HEALTH FACILITIES AVAILABLE IN NGARAMTONI VILLAGE
When the focus group local government leaders, are interviewed to establish the health facilities available in Ngaramtoni village, they said that; Ngaramtoni village has only one government dispensary, one private hospital (Selian Hospital), also said that in Ngaramtoni township area there are 10 pharmacy shops.

4.2 HEALTH SERVICES AVAILABLE IN THE AREA

A visit has been made to some of the dispensaries to establish, kind of health services offered/provided by the dispensaries and Hospitals. The nurses and Doctors said that the most prevalence services are Malaria, pneumonia, water born diseases, HIV/AIDS, cancer and TB cases.
4.3 DISTANCE TO WHICH THE RE-FERAL HOSPITAL IS LOCATED (SELIAN)
The referral hospital which is Selian and sometimes Mt. Meru Hospital are easily accessible. The Selian Hospital is more closer to the Ngaramtoni community about 5Kms. Mt. Meru hospital is about 15KM from Ngaramtoni community, but public transport is easily available (daladala buses).
4.4 AVAILABILITY OF TRANSPORT TO REACH THE HEALTH FACILITIES
People interview admitted that accessibility of transport to access the health facilities is easily available all the time; daladala buses and taxis services are readily available; as well as affordable.
4.5 THE NURSE / PATIENT RATIO AT THE HEALTH FACILITIES
The visit has been made to Kimnyak ward dispensary which is the government dispensary and spoke to the nurse in charge asking her is the rate of patient with regards to the number of nurses and doctors in the dispensary. The nurse said that the dispensary is served by only 3 nurses and one rural medical aids assistant. Basing on their records, an average of 350 patients visit the dispensary for different health problems. This given an average of 88 patients per nurse per day . For the private dispensary their records shows that they have 6 nurses one medical assistant doctor and one dentist. In terms of patients visiting the dispensary (CRC Dispensary) in a day, records shows that they receive an average of 250 patients. This makes an average of 42 patient per nurse per day and average of 250 patients per one doctor per day and 250 patients with dental problems per one dentist.

4.6 FREE HEALTH SERVICES OR PAYABLE
When a cross section of people asked if they pay for medical services the respond is yes, much more in private dispensaries and hospitals. In the government or hospital, interviewed people said, the cost sharing system is applicable, where they pay less compared to private dispensaries or hospital.
4.7 MAJOR HEALTH SERVICES PROVIDER
The survey done, reveal that the major health service provider is the private sector, whereby, there are 3 private dispensaries in the area, and one private hospital (Selian) in relation to only one government dispensary, available in the area.

4.8 RAPID POPULATION INCREASE IN RELATION TO INCREASE HEALT SERVICES
Many people interviewed confirm that there is booming population in Ngaramtoni village, but the health services improvement or increase has been static for a longtime.
4.9 WHETHER THERE ARE WELL TRAINED NURSES AND DOCTORS, WORKING
IN THE HEALTH FACILITIES:
As per interviews conducted with the heads of the facilities they said that, the nurses and doctors are moderately trained, but they have plans to up-grade the skills through, on the job training and short courses.

4.10 PENDING PLANS OR PROPOSALS TO INCREASE HEALTH FACILITIES OR ENHANCE HEALTH SERVICES
Through the visit to the village, government office; MR.OLARIP MBARIO, the village executive officer was interviewed and he said that the government is planning to construct a health center in the area as well as one government hospitals.

HEALTH STRESS CHART

S/NO.
Health stress in Ngaramtoni village
Causes of stress
Community assets
1.
Few health facilities and services in the area.
*Lack of government effort to invest in health facilities.
*Lack of volunteerism to contribute resources to build more health facilities in the area.
*Pending government plans and proposals; to build more health facilities.
*Private sector so the needs and potential due to rapid population growth
*people wiliness to contribute resources if they are well organized.
2.
Low nurses/doctors patient ratio
Lack of qualified and trained nurses
*Lack of motivation to train in medical, profession due to low wages.
*Few medical training colleges.
*Government pending plans to train more
*Medical personal
*More private medical training colleges are emerging
*More people are now starting to be interested due to high demand and attractive packages especially in the private health facilities.
3.
High cost of health services
*Low income (poverty)
*Economic aspects of inflation
*Low government subsidies
*People willingness to work very hard ro raise their incomes to be able to meet high health services and other basic needs.
4.
Long distance to the referral Hospital
*Only one re-feral Hospital is available in the area.
*Government pending plans to build a health facility to cater for re-feral cases in the area.
*People willing and motivated to contribute if they are well organized and mobilized.
*Private sector attracted to build more health facilities to cater for referral cases, because of high demand due to rapid population growth.

AREA OF FOCUS AND THE PROBLEM TO BE ADDRESSED
From the needs assessment conducted during my attachment with the Ngaramtoni village community, the majority of the community were on the consensus that, short and long-term plans are needed to reduce and ultimately stops, the problem of random disposal of solid waste (Inorganic waste) In Ngaramtoni village. Apart from other types of waste, solid waste has been ranked to be the leading environmental pollutant in the area. Currently the village authority and the central government and even NGOs and CBOs non has pending plans to deal with the problem. This project work intends to come up with participatory interventions to the problem, involving all stakeholders in the community, to develop a strategic plan to be implemented by the community members and evaluated by the community members themselves with the assistant of other stakeholders.
This problem was identified through a consultative process, problem tree, focus group discussion; facilitated by Elias O. Ngungat a CED student, Mr. John Ole Daniel, the Co-coordinator of an NGO called Osotwa Mount Meru community based conversation organization, religions leaders, traditional leaders and MR. OLARIP MBARIO the Ngaramtoni Village Executive Officer.

ANNEX 1 GROUP OF INTERVIWED

NO OF INTERVIEWED PERSONS
COMMUNITY GROUP REPRESENTED
MALE/
FEMALE
AREA/LOCATION
4
RELIGIOUS GROUP
M
KILIMO SUB-VILLAGE
MAKAO MAPYA
2
SAW MILL FACTORIES
M
NEAR CENTRAL MARKET
1
BUSINESS MAN
M
BUTCHER AREA NEAR CENTRAL AREA
3
YOUTH SHOE REPAIR & SHOE SHINNERS
M
ALONG THE MAIN ROAD (OLD ROAD) TO OLMOTONYI
1
HAND CRART RIDER YOUTH
M
NGARAMTONI SUB VILLAGE OLORIEN
3
BAR MAIDS
F
KIVULINI BAR
3
“MAMA LISHE”
F
NGARAMTONI CENTRAL MARKETS
2
WHOLESALE SHOPS
M
NGARAMTONI BUS STAND
3
FRUITS & VEGETABLES SELLERS
F
NEAR CENTRAL MARKETS
2
TAILORS
F
ALONG THE MAIN ROAD
4
YOUTH WELDING UNITS AND BATTERY CHARGERS
M
NEAR NAIROBI JUNCTION ROAD
1
TRADITIONAL LEADER
M
DANIEL OLE MEOYEKI
2
HOUSE WIFES
F
KWA MKOLAA AREA
1
MANAGER
M
ARUSHA SEED COMPANY
1
POLITICIAN
M
ALONG SELIAN ROAD
3
LOCAL GOVERNMENT LEADERS FOR NGARAMTONI VILLAGE
M
NEAR THE CENTRAL MARKET
2
NURSES
F
ENGOKIDONG’OI AREA KIMUNYAK VILLAGE
1
ASSISTANT MEDICAL OFFICER
M
CRC DISPENSARY ALONG OLD ROAD
2
NGOs & CBOs STAFF
M
EMAOI AREA AND ALONG OLMOTONYI OLD ROAD
1
TRADITIONAL HEALER (HERBALIST)
M
ALONG SELIAN ROAD
1
LAWYER
M
ALONG NGARAMTONI ROAD
2
SUBSTENCE FARMERS
M
OLEVOLOS


CONCLUSION

Future expectations predict further growth and development of the Ngaramtoni community, which increases social economic needs and pressures. Existing stress will worsen if no sustainable plans are developed to overcome the stresses.
Good and sufficient plans to tackle these stresses will not come about by its own. Most exemplary solutions have come into being as the result of a deliberate interventions on the part of one or more stakeholders in the problems. That is those who have an interest in seeing something happen.
Involving local community actors in needs identification, planning and implementation has in most cases bared good results.

Community participation in problems solving has the following benefits:-
- It creates community vision and sense of ownership.
- It empower community to identify and prioritize key issues, and speed up moral to solve pressing problems.
- It increase chances of success.
- It encourages local experience and innovation in solving the problems.
- It encourages locally available resources to be used to address the problem.
- In most cases, the intervention begins with an assessment planning process, so that the authorities and other stakeholders understand the current situation, agree on common priorities, formulate strategic plans, define the implementation process, take part in the implementation monitoring, and evaluation process.

REFERENCES

1. Maria Muller, Lane Hoffman, community partnership in integrated sustainable waste expertise programme.
2. C.A Moser, G. Kalton; Survey Methods in social investigation (1979) Published by Heinemann Educational Books Ltd. Printed in GB (The chaser Press) Ltd.
3. Internet WWW.lib.az.us/cdt/commneeds.htm Community needs Assessment