Pelsa Facilitator Manual

Facilitator Manual

This manual is intended for Coordinators and other trainers who are responsible for engaging, recruiting, managing and retaining a strong village-based reporter network. Pelsa play a vital role in our information chain and offer quicker reporting of disease and more efficient response from the dinas staff.

The goals for this Pelsa training are to;

• teach new tools for use when reporting disease and allow good opportunity to practice using new skills,
• increase Pelsa confidence and engagement,
• motivate and inspire good practices,
• give reward and acknowledgement,
• strengthen the bond between Pelsa and Dinas staff.

Background

Pelsa have been chosen by their community, with or without the assistance of district veterinary staff, to be a village reporter (pelsa) and contribute to improving the health of livestock in their area, ensuring health problems are reported quickly and helping veterinary staff to respond effectively.

Pelsa play a vital role in Indonesia's animal health system. They are the people closest to the community and closest to the livestock and their owners. Pelsa are the first point of assistance for their community and the first line of defense in protecting their community.

Pelsa provide the farmers with a much needed link to the veterinary services and make it easier for paravets to respond efficiently.

This training material attempts to support coordinators to develop the Pelsa skills, confidence and accuracy in recognising and reporting signs of disease in the local livestock population using iSIKHNAS.

By the end of the course, Pelsa should be able to:

• Know and socialize their role and build good relationship with the community
• Recognise the clinical signs of common and/or important diseases of animals
• Recognise several syndromes that characterise important (priority) infectious diseases
• Use iSIKHNAS for the reporting disease events
• Know who to contact for assistance.

Two approaches

For experienced Pelsa (and experienced Coordinators!)

• Half day training course - iSIKHNAS reporting

For new recruits

• Full day training course - Recognising Signs of Disease and iSIKHNAS reporting

Half day Pelsa Course

Training schedule

Time	Session	Topic
Morning	1	Role and responsibilities of Pelsa (Village Animal Health Reporter) and Recognising health problems
	2	Recognising and Reporting health problems
	3	Reporting Scenarios
	4	Support, Feedback and Graduation

Full Day Pelsa Course

Training schedule

Time	Session	Topic
Morning	1	Role and responsibilities of Pelsa (Village Animal Health Reporter)
	2	Creating good linkages in the community
	3	Recognising health problems
	4	Recognising health problems
Afternoon	5	Reporting health problems
	6	Scenarios
	7	Support and Feedback
	8	Graduation

Preparation and logistics

Registration of new iSIKHNAS users Training Management with the iSIKHNAS website Printing Recognition and Graduation

Session 1: Role and Responsibilities

Pelsa should be able to;

• Recognise signs of animal disease: They should be able to recognise when animals are showing signs that might mean they are suffering from disease, and be able to use a standard vocabulary and their associated codes for describing these signs and syndromes.

• Report signs of animal disease: Pelsa send case reports of sick animals to the veterinary services by sending a special, short, coded SMS. This instantly alerts the local Dinas staff responsible for that area that there is an animal in that Pelsa's village that is showing possible signs of disease. The local Dinas vet or para-vet can then respond to that alert with a phone call to the Pelsa, ask further questions to establish if they should visit or whether they can advise treatment over the phone.

• Be a trusted link to the veterinary services: Some villagers may feel shy or uncomfortable about contacting their Dinas veterinary services staff directly. But as Pelsa are trusted members of their own communities, many villagers will feel much more comfortable talking to a local Pelsa. This may mean that many more cases of disease are reported in villages that have Pelsa, compared to villages without Pelsa. It does not of course mean that villages with pelsa have more disease, just more reported cases. As Pelsa become recognised and appreciated by their community for their work, there will be more people who will want to use their services. This will ensure that the link between the community and the veterinary services stays strong and effective.

• Be a source of information for the community: As the local contact person for their village, Pelsa can provide information from the local Dinas to the community. This may include notifications of animal disease cases or outbreaks in their area, or details of an upcoming vaccination program. Pelsa may also be able to participate or assist in activities related to vaccination or surveillance programs, keep population figures up to date and report the outcomes of various cases including if an animal has recovered from a particular reported problem.

Session 2 : Community linkages

Background

Livestock play multiple roles in people's lives. These include:

• Food and nutrition: animals are a very important source of food [protein]
• Social functions: animals may raise the social status of their owners. They may contribute to gender balance by affording women the opportunity to own livestock. In some communities, animal have a role in cultural or religious practices.
• Contribution to crop production: animals provide draught power and their manure contributes to soil fertility
• Income generation and wealth accumulation: animals may enable saving of wealth, providing security and playing a role as a ‘bank account’ and ‘insurance policy’
• Economic role: animal production may be an important part of the local and regional economy
• Livestock and the environment: livestock production is a part of sustainable land use, although animal production can have both positive and negative impact on the environment
• Risk buffer: in some communities, animal production provides alternative streams of income that buffers against the risks of crop failures.

The health of animals is vitally important to people's lives. Here are some effects of sickness and disease in animals;

• increase the likelihood of poverty for individual farmers and their families,
• threaten food security locally and sometimes more widely,
• negatively affect local economies because people have less money to spend, or local industries start to fail,
• impact the availability of draught power for cropping,
• can be difficult and costly to treat or cure, and to control,
• reduce production of animal products such as milk, eggs, meat,
• can be a direct risk to human health,
• increase the risk of follow-on effects from all of the above.

It is important to get help or advice about animal health problems promptly. The longer the time between first noticing a disease problem and getting help or advice for it, the greater the risk animals and the livestock owning community are at to the above problems. Prompt reporting of problems to get advice about how to deal with it is important. Some problems appear very routine and mundane but even by reporting the problem farmers can help the veterinary services to respond better and find improved solutions for all farmers with the same problem in their livestock.

What stops people from reporting?

• Don't know where to report
• Don't know why to report
• Don't know how to report
• Don't have faith in veterinary services
• Worry about the costs
• Don't care
• Try to treat by themselves
• Don't recognise the signs of disease
• Don't recognise the urgency or importance
• Worry that the vet services will cull their animals
• Take a wait and see approach and sometimes win and sometimes lose

Pelsa can help to break down some of these hurdles or barriers and make it more likely problems of disease will be reported. Pelsa are a vital link between the community and the veterinary services. Pelsa

• are a trusted member of the community,
• have training in signs recognition and the language to describe problems,
• have experience in seeing cases,
• have knowledge of how to report quickly and simply,
• can help provide a continued link, pass on advice and offer assistance with treatments suggested by the vet services,
• can determine if a problem appears to be of higher priority than others,
• can observe problems even when the farmer has not and suggest a problem is reported,
• can be a useful source of information, warnings, and advice to the community,
• understands that reporting disease can bring benefit to the community as well as to the individual farmer.

Pelsa can increase their network in their community by

• being easily and readily available,
• being open, friendly and helpful,
• being responsible and trustworthy,
• caring about the people and animals who live together,
• having a charged mobile phone with pelsa,
• wanting to improve in skills and knowledge about animal health,
• knowing when to listen and when to call for help.

Session

Some disease is chronic and some appears suddenly

Training points

Graphics and visuals