Permaculture, Final Capstone Paper 5-26, Hope - Never Ending Food

each focus group consisted of 6 to 9 participants falling within the suggested focus group range
of 4-12 participants widely accepted in qualitative analysis (Rossman and Rallis, 2003). Because
time constraints prevented a formal focus group in Nkhata Bay, interviews with Nkhata Bay
participants were more in-depth and included many of the questions addressed in focus groups in
other regions.
Such qualitative data was analyzed primarily by coding participant responses into
previously generated categories based on agriculture practices and on constraints and barriers of
Permaculture Practice. This qualitative data collection provided insights that would not have
been possible from quantitative data alone. Results are presented in the following sections.
Qualitative data collection is at the heart of the PDI providing not only contextual information
for understanding the quantitative data, but also by allowing the farmers themselves to be the
experts.
Limitations
The design of this research emerged from the field and was heavily influenced by needs
and wants of the PNM. Because access to contemporary literature on adoption of agricultural
practices was extremely limited, the data collection was more general than might have been the
case, resulting in a fair amount of unused information. Although the survey instrument was
lengthy, there were, in retrospect, some important gaps in that data collection, such as distance to
markets and civic engagement. Both areas have been addressed in the adoption literature and
may have been useful explanatory factors in this inquiry. Although enough data was collected to
create the variables employed and agriculturalsales, these categories emerged post-data
collection and consequently, there is no qualitative information attached to these variables.
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