Contribution of Development Communication on Project Effectiveness: A Case Study of the Water Resources Sub-Sector in

The concept of development communication having originated from Asia has been absorbed and endorsed by various institutions, organizations and projects for the purposes of social change in a community or a country. Employing development communication in organizations, institutions and projects has proven to be very useful. The main techniques of development communication include information dissemination, social marketing, social mobilization, media advocacy and seminars/conferences. The contribution of development communication on project effectiveness in Kenya is a subject of great interest considering the fact that Kenya is a country with various sources of media and communication but still lags behind when it comes to development communication. The purpose of this research was to find out what contribution development communication has on project effectiveness in Kenya, in this case the Water Resources Sub-Sector. The study adopted two designs which are namely qualitative and quantitative research designs and used purposive sampling technique in the selection of the Water Resource User Associations (WRUAs) to be used for the study. Data was collected by use of interviews. The interview respondents were WRUA representatives who were involved in the Imarisha Naivasha Water Stewardship Project that was as a result of a partnership between Imarisha Naivasha, International Water Stewardship Programme (IWaSP), Water Resources Authority (WRA), World Wild Fund for Nature (WWF), Lake Naivasha Basin Umbrella WRUA (LANABWRUA) and the 12 WRUAs in the Lake Naivasha Basin catchment area. Data collected was to prove whether or not development communication helps in the attainment of various goals institutions and projects have. Content analysis was used for qualitative data which was coded and organized into thematic areas whereas quantitative data was analyzed by Chi-Square test and percentages. In the analysis chapter, each and every development communication tool in this study was looked at and its ratings analyzed. It was found that seminars had the highest ratings followed by social mobilization, information dissemination and then media advocacy. In the conclusion chapter the most effective tool of development communication was stated and recommended for use by other projects in future.