By this stage, the country project proposal is approved and funded. This section deals with the fourth stage of the project, the conduct of the field and policy research. It has been suggested that the adaptive strategies must be derived by the researcher and discussed with communities, and that a direct approach would probably be of limited value. Since the concept "adaptive strategy" is ours, not theirs, it is suggested that the study should be conceptualized as an analytical geographical history of the last two to three decades in which specific knowledge objectives could be attained. Thus the actual field work has three stages, only in the third stage of which is there a public attempt to analyze and deduce adaptive strategies.

This was the approach followed by project teams in South Africa, Burkina Faso, and Ethiopia. Nevertheless, the example of Zimbabwe, shows that one can do things quite differently provided that there is sufficient familiarity with local culture and idiom.