ABSTRACT
Since the mid-1980s, community-based techniques for gathering ethnographic data have become a regular part of international health, nutrition, and environmental planning. Used by researchers, policy makers, and field practitioners, these qualitative data collection methods have been designed to improve program effectiveness by providing timely community-level information for project planning, implementation, and monitoring. As a supplement to quantitative survey methods, ethnographic data provide critical information on cultural beliefs and behaviors influencing nutritional health and the impacts of nutritional interventions within and among communities. The data allow development professionals to “scale down” summit-level policies to meet more appropriately the particular needs or conditions of local communities. They also suggest possibilities for “scaling-up” local community actions (see chapter by Uvin, this volume) to address development problems more widely across regions, countries, or development domains.
