IEG Fast Track Brief

32 items available

Permanent URI for this collection

http://hdl.handle.net/10986/9411

Fast Track Briefs inform the World Bank Group (WBG) managers and staff about new evaluation findings and recommendations.

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Now showing 1 - 10 of 11

The World Bank’s Involvement in Global and Regional Partnership Programs: An Independent Assessment

(World Bank, Washington, DC, 2011-03-10) Independent Evaluation Group

The objectives of the Global and Regional Partnership Programs (GRPPs) that Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) has reviewed have been highly relevant. Most programs have had positive achievements in terms of outputs. The sustainability of a number of programs is threatened by weak resource mobilization strategies, failure to keep up with the changing global and regional context, and difficulties in demonstrating results at the outcome level. The Bank’s management and oversight of GRPPs shows strengths and weaknesses. Many task teams have brought extraordinary dedication and ownership to their programs. The Bank hasplayed to its comparative advantage in convening and mobilizing resources for new programs.But the implementation of the Bank’s strategic and policy agenda to promote effective partnershipshas essentially stalled over the last three years.The DGF has had a number of successes, but it is no longer the umbrella facility for the Bank’sgrant financing arrangements. During its strategic reorientation toward a “venture capital” model,the DGF should focus on building sustainable institutional arrangements for new programs that can survive the Bank’s financial exit and on securing multi donor financing from the outset.
Poverty Reduction Support Credits : An Evaluation of World Bank Support

(Washington, DC, 2009-11) World Bank

Poverty Reduction Support Credits (PRSCs) were intended to help countries implement comprehensive, country-owned development strategies to promote growth, improve social conditions, and reduce poverty. PRSCs were intended to ease conditionality, make annual flows to recipient countries predictable and integrated with their budgets, strengthen domestic budget processes, provide a framework for donor harmonization, and focus on achieving results. In terms of process, PRSCs have worked well. Findings show that they incorporated many envisaged changes in design and implementation. These include stronger country ownership, eased conditionality, and a shift of focus towards public sector management and pro-poor service delivery. PRSCs balanced tensions between predictability and program credibility. Although PRSCs differed from preceding adjustment loans, development policy lending today has converged towards a similar design. PRSCs today are subject to the same guidelines as other Development Policy Loans (DPLs). Differences remain in practice in terms of the association with PRSPs, broad scope, programmatic nature, and country performance. The evaluation recommends either that PRSCs be phased out as a separate brand name or that these differences be clearly spelled out.
Annual Review of Development Effectiveness 2009 : Achieving Sustainable Development

(Washington, DC, 2009-07) World Bank

The 2008 World Bank project performance data shows improvement in achieving development outcomes, allaying concerns that the weakened 2007 performance could signal a new downward trend. The decline in performance in 2007 was modest, and it has rebounded in 2008. Bank performance is rated on a six-point scale, from highly satisfactory to highly unsatisfactory. The percentage of satisfactory projects increased in 2008, continuing a steady upward trend over the past 15 years. Analysis of the dates of the major turnarounds in project performance suggests that a combination of better Bank sector policies and improved country circumstances outside of Bank control may explain much of the turnaround, rather than internal administrative reforms at the Bank, although the latter may have facilitated improvement already underway. The 2009 Management Action Record (MAR) tracks Bank adoption of recent Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) recommendations and shows that adoption levels are declining. IEG is currently examining ways to improve the MAR to create a more effective product for tracking implementation of recommendations and identify reasons for the trend decline. Although part of this may be attributed to the shifting nature of development assistance, not all of it is. An assessment of the use of cost-benefit tools in environmental projects largely confirms this conclusion. This issue will be taken up in greater detail in an IEG special report in FY2010.
Earnings Growth and Employment Creation : An Assessment of World Bank Support in Three Middle-Income Countries

(Washington, DC, 2009-06) World Bank

This assessment reviews earnings and employment outcomes in Colombia, Tunisia, and Turkey during 1998-2007, as well as five policy areas (the MILES framework) likely to affect those outcomes: macroeconomic conditions, investment climate, labor regulations, education, and social protection. Employment-related outcomes in the three countries were mixed, with notable progress in economic growth, earnings and poverty reduction, but not in the employment to- population ratio or unemployment rate. This underscores the desirability of focusing on the full set of employment-related variables Gross Domestic Product (GDP), poverty, employment, unemployment, and earnings - in an integrative fashion rather than just on employment when setting the objectives of Bank support. This focus will need better employment-related statistics, an area where the Bank can help further. Bank objectives in the three countries focused more on MILES components than on employment itself. Bank support in the three countries achieved differential progress in the individual MILES components, with the most progress on macro stabilization, followed in approximate order by progress on the investment climate, education, social protection, and labor taxation and regulations. The experience of the three countries illustrates how analytic and advisory activities can be the main instrument of support in those areas where progress in reform is difficult and the need for building engagement and consensus is critical.
The World Bank’s Country Policy and Institutional Assessment — An Evaluation

(Washington, DC, 2009-06) World Bank

The World Bank's Country Policy and Institutional Assessment (CPIA) assess the conduciveness of a country's policy and institutional framework to poverty reduction, sustainable growth, and the effective use of development assistance. It plays an important role in the country performance ratings that have been used for allocating resources from the International Development Association (IDA) to eligible countries since 1980. This evaluation takes the premise that beyond informing IDA allocation, the CPIA is useful as a broad indicator of development effectiveness. It assesses the relevance of the content of the CPIA through a review of the economics literature. It also assesses the reliability of CPIA ratings in two ways-through comparing CPIA ratings with similar indicators, and through reviewing the CPIA ratings generation process. Based on these assessments, the evaluation derives recommendations for enhancing the CPIA.
Independent Evaluation of IFC’s Development Results 2009 : Knowledge for Private Sector Development

(Washington, DC, 2009-05) World Bank

The independent evaluation of International Finance Corporation's (IFC's) development results 2009 assesses the development outcomes and additionality (unique role and contribution) of IFC interventions. It analyzes factors driving results, and reviews performance patterns on a thematic topic. This year's thematic is IFC's Advisory Services (AS), knowledge services that IFC provides to either private companies or governments in support of private sector development. To enhance development impact, the report recommends that IFC: i) effectively manage the tension between protecting the portfolio and responding to opportunities during crisis; ii) set out an overall strategy for IFC advisory services, addressing the need for a clear vision and business framework and more closely linked with IFC's global corporate strategy; iii) pursue more programmatic AS interventions; iv) improve execution of the AS pricing policy; and v) strengthen AS performance measurement and internal knowledge management.
Review of IDA Internal Controls : An Evaluation of Management’s Assessment and the IAD Review

(Washington, DC, 2009-01) World Bank

International Development Association (IDA) stakeholders want to be assured that IDA complies with its articles and policies, and that the funds it provides for development purposes are used as intended and have measurable results. A key purpose of IDA's control system is to provide such assurance. Hence, the Board of Executive Directors requested a full evaluation of the system by the Independent Evaluation Group (IEG), through an assessment by IDA management and a review by the Internal Audit Department. The evaluation is the first of its kind not only for the Bank but also for all international financial organizations. In this sense the Bank and IDA have taken an important lead in assessment of internal controls. The analysis includes several recommendations. First, controls over possible fraud and corruption in IDA operations should be addressed on a broad front, starting with risk management processes and country assistance strategies, and including the development and deployment of specific additional instruments directed at fraud and corruption issues at the level of programs and projects. Second, the implementation of remedies for the other control deficiencies should be closely monitored. Management has recognized the need for such remedies, and many are contained in the Governance and Anti-corruption (GAC) program currently being implemented (including some still under preparation). These remedies appear in both scope and content to address the key issues, and they correspond well to those suggested by IEG in this report. However, they are not yet sufficiently operative to be tested and, if effective, thereby lessen the materiality of the controls weaknesses identified. IEG thus believes it would be premature to conclude that fraud and corruption (F&C) risks have been successfully resolved under the current IDA controls framework.
IFC in Nigeria : An Independent Country Impact Review

(Washington, DC, 2008-10) World Bank

Independent Evaluation Group's (IEG's) country impact review (the report) examines if, from July 1998 through December 2007, International Finance Corporation (IFC): (i) successfully defined a relevant and appropriate strategy for helping Nigeria tackle its most pressing needs; (ii) provided investment and advisory services that were reflective of IFC's strategy; and (iii) achieved positive development results. IFC's strategies in Nigeria reflected the characteristics of IFC's process for development of country strategies jointly with the World Bank. These characteristics include: (i) poor integration with IFC's main strategy and budget process; (ii) loosely formulated country objectives and priorities in terms of sectors and products; and (iii) little or no resource allocation. As a result, IFC's strategies for Nigeria have not fulfilled their purpose of setting priorities, defining targets, and securing the human, organizational, and other resources required.
Climate Change and the World Bank Group - Phase I : An Evaluation of World Bank Win-Win Energy Policy Reforms

(Washington, DC, 2008-08) World Bank

The first of a series on climate change, this evaluation assesses International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) and International Development Association (IDA) experience with key win-win policies in the energy sector. It focuses on energy price reform and policies for energy efficiency, both of which offer potentially large gains at the country level together with significant reductions in greenhouse gas emissions. The next phase will look at the project experience of the Bank (including the carbon funds) and the International Finance Corporation (IFC) in promoting technologies for renewable energy and energy efficiency. Transport and forestry issues will also be evaluated. The record levels of energy prices in 2008, although they have been relaxed, provide an impetus for clients to seek more sustainable and price-resilient growth paths. The Bank can proactively help interested clients to assess the domestic benefits of price reform and efficiency policies, explore design options, and finance their implementation. This will require a reorientation of the Bank's internal incentives, and adoption of a systems approach to energy and climate. These efforts will complement the crucial steps developed countries must take to reduce their own greenhouse gas emissions and to provide financial and technical help for mitigation by developing countries, consistent with United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) commitments and the Bali action plan.
An Evaluation of Bank Support for Decentralization in Client Countries

(Washington, DC, 2008-08) World Bank

Developing countries have decentralized functions and responsibilities for service delivery to lower levels of government at an increasing pace in recent years. The main reasons for such reforms are often political, but governments adopt them also as a way to improve service delivery and local governance. Typically, after the political decision is made, a country will turn to its development partners including the World Bank for support in implementing the new policies and achieving their development objectives. Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) assessed the effectiveness of Bank support for decentralization between FY90 and FY07 in 20 countries, seeking to inform the design and implementation of future support. Given the difficulties of measuring the results of decentralization, the evaluation used intermediate outcome indicators such as strengthened legal and regulatory frameworks for intergovernmental relations, improved administrative capacity, and increased accountability of sub-national governments and functionaries to higher levels of government and to local citizens to assess the results of Bank support in these 20 cases. To examine potential lessons at a sectoral level, the evaluation also assessed whether Bank support for decentralization improved intermediate outcomes for service delivery in the education sector in 6 of the 20 countries.