Given Hapunda

118  Increases support, cooperation and success chances for a given project, programme or policy.  Data collected helps to identify interactions between different stakeholders thus avoid duplication of work and enhance ways to merger stakeholders.  Researchers facilitate the inclusion of stakeholders that would otherwise be overlooked.  Needs to be conducted on a regular basis as actual stakeholders, their interests and relationships may change overtime.  The exercise can be subjective.  Mere fact of identifying stakeholders does not guarantee their commitment to the project, programme or policy so other methods like interviews may be needed to complement it. Document Review  Relatively cheaper than collecting your own raw data which may be expensive to do.  Reliable source for detailed background information.  Does not need participants, that may be difficult to find and unwilling to be respondents.  Information in documents can easily be referred to and verified in less time.  Document review is flexible and can be done anytime at the researcher’s convenience.  Documents may contain out-dated or incomplete data.  Documents are susceptible to tampering especially where the document is electronic.  One has little or no control over the quality of data contained in documents.  Documents may not provide enough information to answer all research questions.  Relevant documents may be classified, thus inaccessible or not available for use by researchers. Transects  Increases indigenous and local knowledge on land use or natural resources among others.  Appropriate for communities with low-literacy levels.  Transects are more participatory and this enhances a sense of ownership of programmes and projects by stakeholders.  Very useful in data validation as actual situation is captured in a diagram.  In order to have a good transect diagram, the researcher needs to have good participatory, observation and graphic skills.  Like direct observation, transects rely on current observable situations and not past events.  Unavailability of local participants/analysts makes the exercise difficulty or impossible. Semi-structured interviews  Appropriate for sensitive topics as it enhances privacy and confidentiality.  The flexibility in asking questions helps the researcher to probe and get clarification on all important topics resulting in detailed and rich information.  The mere fact that this method is semi-structured and not fixed allows free flow of responses making the interview more natural compared to a questionnaire.  Prone to interviewer bias  Interviewer needs to have good research skills including communication, probing and experience to successfully conduct interviews.  The interviewer needs to have basic knowledge of the topic under research.