Preparation Stage – Planning & Organising

3.6 What are the key issues concerning the poor?

Ensuring the management team has poverty skills

The poor and other marginalised groups should be a key part of the consultation process at the stage of planning and organising. Ideally, the task force must include a member (or members) with skills and knowledge of service delivery to the poor. They could be either members of the community, who know the situation of those on low incomes, or public sector representatives who have worked on poverty issues before. Alternatively, it is possible to involve a consultant with related experience, who will provide objective recommendations to the both sides: the provider of the service (the private contractor) and its acceptor – the municipality.

It is important to keep in mind that poverty not only relates to economic factors such as insufficient income, lack of assets and lack of access to decent jobs. Poverty also relates to: social, political and cultural factors such as discrimination based on gender, ethnicity, caste, age or disability; lack of access to education and training; bad health; lack of representation; lack of empowerment; and vulnerability to shocks and crises. All these factors are interrelated and, as a consequence, people with skills and knowledge in all these complex matters should be included in the planning and organising process.