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Contributions from
the Column
Studies and reports
Islands of stability in a sea of poppies
PRSPs remain unconvincing so far
“The atrocities committed
would today be termed genocide”
Hopes pinned on civil society
10/2004 |
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[ Fight against poverty ]
PRSPs remain unconvincing so far
It’s a good idea to improve cooperation between donor and recipient countries in the fight against poverty by means of country specific strategy papers. However, the reality of using so-called Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (PRSPs) shows serious shortcomings. This is the conclusion the evaluation departments of the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF) draw after simultanously having assessed the PRSP process to date. The key criticisms are: the PRSP initiatives do not give enough consideration to country-specific requirements; the influence of the World Bank and the IMF is heading in the wrong direction; PRSPs to date are inadequate in terms of content, and the donor coordination hoped for is not happening. An up-to-date study of the German NGO Kindernothilfe (Help for Children in Need) also indicates deficiencies in the PRSP practice.
The approximately 40 PRSPs presented so far show clear shortcomings, according to the Operations Evaluation Department (OED) of the World Bank and the Independent Evaluation Office (IEO) of the IMF. Instead of drafting economic policy strategies, PRSPs focus on public expenditure for basic social services such as education and health. Above all, PRSPs do not address how to achieve more growth in poor countries in order provide the resources required to reduce poverty, OED and IEO claim. For this reason, PRSPs were of no use as concepts to build poverty reduction programmes on, the IMF evaluation states.
The assessors do not blame the countries so much as the characteristics of the PRSP initiatives. The general approach places too great a value on certain procedures (transparency and participation, for example) and neglects issues of content. On the other hand, many countries are simply overtaxed by the requirements and deadlines of the initiatives. The approach is not flexible enough to react to varying local conditions. As a consequence, the countries concentrate on drawing up the papers required by the donors to meet the deadline, which then all correspond to the same concept and have similar contents. The actual goal of the papers – to identify country-specific problems and to work out priorities for poverty reduction – is missed.
The task of the World Bank and IMF is to support the PRSP countries in reaching this goal. According to the assessors, however, neither institution has fulfilled this role. This results from a structural error. The PRSP process was invented by the donors, who are also responsible for the rules. At the same time, the initiatives are based on the idea of the partner countries taking ownership and assuming responsibility. For this reason, the World Bank and the IMF largely restricted their involvement to technical support and abstained from advising the partners in the drafting of the content of the PRSPs. The assessors see this reserve as an error. In summarising their comments, ownership should mean flexibly applying the requirements in form and content in accordance with the country’s initial position. At the same time, Bank and Fund should support the countries in utilising this flexibility and in drafting tailor-made strategy papers.
As far as the OED and IEO are concerned, the shortcomings of the PRSPs in terms of content have also caused the papers’ failure to influence the development policy of donor countries so far. Another important goal of the PRSP initiative – improving the coordination between donors in order to increase the efficiency of their poverty reduction programmes – was not attained.
Kindernothilfe has also complains about the high speed in which the PRSPs were drawn up. Its evaluation says the papers ignore social reality. Around half of the documents examined did not mention the subject of child labour at all and the others only touched on it cursorily. Programmes which relieve the situation of working children and young people were also lacking, as were programmes which might include them as agents in the development process. On the topic of ownership, the Kindernothilfe study notes that the poorest developing countries desperately depend on the inflow of funds and are therefore bowing to the task imposed on them of drawing up PRSPs. In reading the strategy papers, Kindernothilfe did not sense a trace of true identification or any connection with the agenda of the Millennium Development Goals. (ell/dem)
Further information:
IMF evaluation:
http://www.imf.org/External/NP/ieo/2004/prspprgf/eng/index.htm
The World Bank evaluation:
http://www.worldbank.org/oed/prsp/index.html
The Kindernothilfe study:
http://www.kindernothilfe.de/downloads/ka_prsp_mar_20041.pdf
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