Key Informant Interviews

Key informant interviews provide insight into the lived experience of a process and the construction and negotiation of meaning to interpret the experience (Cloke et al. 2004). For this study, I define key informants as persons whose perspective was valuable in understanding the practices of FONAG and its interaction with targeted rural

communities in the watershed. As this research follows the process of translating PES into lives and landscapes, key informant interviews were a valuable source of data. Table 2.3 summarizes the categories of the key informants that I interviewed.

52 Category Informants FONAG employees 11 Representatives of FONAG Constituent Members 7

 The Nature Conservancy 3

 Quito’s Water Company 1

 Consortium CAMAREN 1 FONAG Páramo guards

(Intermediaries between FONAG and Communities)

7

Members of FONAG targeted Communities 54  Quinchucajas 13  Paquiestancia 11  Cariacu 13  Oyacachi 8  Other communities 9 Other affiliates of FONAG 8

Total 92

Table 2.3 Number of research informants by category

I developed two sets of semi-structured, open-ended questions. The open-ended questions permitted interviewees to respond in their own words instead of with specific response options. After the initial response to the questions, I used free format follow-up questions to clarify responses (Montello and Sutton 2006). The first set addressed FONAG officials, representatives of constituent member organizations, and

representatives of affiliate organizations that included donors and collaborators. These questions focused on the position of the firm rather than individual opinions. I conducted each of these interviews at the office of the interviewee, with prior notice.

I prepared another set of questions directed towards members of the community, and sought to gain insight on their perspective through focusing on community member

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experience with FONAG projects. I interviewed the community president, the páramo guard for the project, and community members that had participated in the FONAG project for each of the four case study communities. Because páramo guards are simultaneously a part of the community and of FONAG, they received questions from both categories and they received questions specific to their work, such as how the páramo guard became involved with FONAG or what the process was for organizing a project within the community. While I conducted the majority of community member interviews on the interviewee’s property, I maintained flexibility to conduct interviews in a variety of locations depending on the availability and preference of the interviewee. I conducted one interview, for example, on a bus travelling from Cayambe to Oyacachi because the interviewee found that to be the most convenient moment for an interview.

I recruited interviewees in various ways. I contacted FONAG for interviews with employees, and FONAG also provided me with a list of the representatives of its

constituent members and affiliates. I attempted to contact the representatives of all six of the financially-contributing constituent organizations of FONAG, but unfortunately only three of the six organizations responded for interviews after multiple attempts to contact them. For data about the other three constituent organizations, I have relied primarily on document material to ascertain the extent of their involvement in FONAG.

To recruit members from the case study communities for interviews, I first contacted the community’s páramo guard. The páramo guard subsequently introduced me to members of the community involved with FONAG for interviews. I then

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another potential participant for the study or gave me contact information of potential participants. The main target of my research was the small subset of community members, typically a group of less than 20 individuals, directly involved in FONAG projects within a case study community.

I also initiated a few random sample interviews in each case study community to include perspectives and experiences of FONAG’s involvement in communities that might be passed over through the snow-ball sampling technique in my investigation. These interviews began with informal conversations that only occurred after I had made frequent visits to each community and had been present at public community events, such as summer festivals or community assembly meetings. This technique enabled me to initiate interviews with community residents that were not directly involved with FONAG projects as well as a few community members directly involved in the FONAG projects that did not appear in the snow-ball sampling technique. As a whole, the

community interviews provided detail about individual and group experiences with FONAG projects that has thus far been absent in studies of FONAG. I analyzed the community interviews as a set to identify points of convergence and divergence in experiences and perceptions with FONAG projects. I also triangulated the interviews with other data, such as documentation and participant observation.

Conducting interviews without a formal introduction or prior recognition within a community was difficult. Four members from case study communities declined

interviews and referred me to speak with members of the community governing council. This interaction usually started with me approaching the house, knocking on the door

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and introducing myself. In each of these cases, the individuals offered me the phone number of the president of the community. One of them made a point to call the

president of the community on her cell phone, and subsequently told me to contact him about my research project first before proceeding. Conducting interviews was therefore a time-intensive process because it involved building social relationships within a community in addition to administering the interview itself.