Sustainable Livelihoods Approach (SLA)

Click to jump to a section in this page:

• Background

• The Asset Pentagon

• Phase 1 - outcomes

• Phase 1 - who was involved

• Phase 2

Background: Discussions though the fall and winter of 2001 brought Opportunities’ partners to a point of agreeing that poverty is best understood in terms of a person’s lack of certain building blocks, or assets, of self-sufficiency.  Following the work of the Women’s Economic Development Consortium and the Department of International Development, people at Opportunities noted each person’s need for five types of assets depicted in the form of a pentagon. 

The asset pentagon is only one component of the complex and much larger framework of the Sustainable Livelihoods Approach (Sustainable Livelihoods Guidance Sheets, Department for International Development (DFID) www.dfid.gov.uk/).  

The Asset Pentagon visually represents 5 asset areas or a person’s existing strengths that speak of the holistic aspect of everyday living:

• Financial - financial income, in-kind services, no debt

• Social - relationships of trust and exchange

• Personal - self-worth, purpose, emotional well-being, self-confidence

• Physical - housing, food security, childcare          

• Human - health, skills and capabilities necessary to increase the other asset areas

The circle represents the natural asset area - the environment from which all assets stem and include: Land / Air (air quality), Water (water quality), Forestry, Coastal Resources, Seasonality, etc.

The assets are integral to one another, and action (or inaction) in one may have a serious impact on another.  All assets need to increase in order to achieve a sustainable livelihood, although not necessarily at once.

The key point is that poverty reduction, according to this understanding, is not a matter of plugging gaps or closing cracks, much less saving the people who fall through them.  Poverty reduction becomes instead a process of building and maintaining the assets that sustain self-sufficiency. 

This asset-building perspective describes a vast array of actions that Waterloo Region and its external partners (governments, corporations, institutions) may consider in order to create meaningful opportunities for citizens.  It’s an invitation to integrate community action and factors that might otherwise remain disconnected.

In February, 2002 a decision was made by the Leadership Roundtable to adopt/adapt the approach to Opportunities.

Phase I consisted of a 1-year project that explored the use of the Sustainable Livelihoods Approach in Waterloo Region at the individual and program levels. 

Outcomes included: 

• most significantly, participants liked the fact that it helped them view their lives from a positive and holistic perspective.  The tool appears to be empowering.

• Successful simplification of a complex SLA framework in order to implement at the individual and program levels

• a method was developed for programs to monitor and evaluate program effectiveness

• a comprehensive document of learnings was produced

• various tools were designed to support the initiative and are included in the document

• a prototype database was designed as a way to collect and analyze the data

• the creation of a new pentagon that summarizes vulnerabilities was produced

      Who was involved:

Pilot project participants:

• Cambridge Self-Help Food Bank and YWCA of Cambridge through Small Steps to Success (SSTS) Program

• Regional Municipality of Waterloo through the National Child Benefit (NCB) Community Outreach Program

• Lutherwood-CODA through  the Community Support Services Program

• YMCA Settlement/Integration Services of Cambridge through the Employment Services Program

• Cambridge Kiwanis Village Non-Profit Housing Corporation through the Supporting Housing Options for Youth

Funded by:

• The Ontario Trillium Foundation

• United Way of Kitchener-Waterloo and Area

• United Way of Cambridge and North Dumfries

• Community Economic Development Technical Assistance Program (CEDTAP)

For further details, see the document Putting People First: Exploring Sustainable Livelihoods Approach in Waterloo Region. 2004 available online or at the Opportunities Waterloo Region office.

Phase II will explore how this model could be used at organizational and community levels.

Four organizations continue to use the SLA in their work.  National Child Benefit Outreach Program (Region of Waterloo); Small Steps to Success (Cambridge Self-Help Food Bank and YWCA of Cambridge); Employment Services (YWCA Settlement/Integration Services – Cambridge) and Opportunities Waterloo Region.

Opportunities Waterloo Region continues to be available for support and offers SLA information sessions.  Our organization is presently exploring ways to implement the SLA model into our work.

The YES project will consider using the SLA in its monitoring and evaluation strategies.

Contact us for more information on this initiative.

Opportunities Waterloo Region

235 King Street East,

    Kitchener, ON N2G 4N5

    Tel: (519) 883-2353

    Fax: (519) 568-8587

Send us an e-mail with questions or comments about this web site.
Last modified: 07/11/06