A Narrative Review of Community Engagement in the Identification, Implementation, Monitoring and Evaluation of Health Projects in Tanzania

Abstract

Community engagement in development projects enhances community ownership, improves capacities of the involved stakeholders, and  ensures sustainability of projects. Reviews have focused on community engagement in water projects, road construction and  education services. This study reviewed the community engagement in health projects due to their importance to human life. A narrative  review was conducted, mainly through ResearchGate, GoogleSearch, GoogleScholar and ScienceDirect. A conceptual framework was  constructed based on the reviewed literature. The study found that there were health projects which were successfully implemented due  to proper community engagement while to most of the projects the community engagement was faced with numerous challenges  including poor communication between technical staff and the community; unqualified technical staff; poor community engagement  process; poor management capability and limited transparency. While success of health projects is subject to numerous factors, community engagement throughout the project is crucial because it influences the other factors. Therefore, community engagement ought to receive the utmost importance when contemplating planning and implementing health projects. There is a need to employ  technical staff who are well-trained and experienced in community mobilization before projects identification starts. This should be  coupled with supporting community engagement in all stages of a project.