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Asian Development Fund VII: Progress Report (1999) : III. Operational Priorites
A. Areas of Emphasis14. In particular, donors requested the Bank to focus on poverty reduction and pay increasing attention to efforts in human development, gender equity, protection of the environment, promotion of good governance, and promotion of broad-based and sustainable economic growth and development. They emphasized that effective implementation of policy and operational changes introduced thus far and the consolidation of the Bank's achievements in these areas over the last few years should form a primary focus of ADF VII. Through its strategic planning process, the Bank had formally adopted five strategic development objectives:
The donors urged the Bank to incorporate monitorable performance indicators in performance assessments on the achievement of these objectives. They requested the Bank to intensify its efforts to reach the poorest and most disadvantaged segments of society, invest in human capital of the poor and women, and cooperate with nongovernment organizations (NGOs) and other grass-roots level organizations to provide assistance to the most disadvantaged groups. They looked forward to the policy papers on poverty reduction, indigenous peoples, and women-in-development, which the Bank was preparing. 15. The serious slowdown that the regional financial crisis is causing in the economies of many DMCs that remain ADF borrowers (e.g. Lao PDR and Viet Nam) and the consequent social impacts they must address (e.g. on urban low fixed-wage earners as well as more disadvantaged social segments) are adding urgency to the attention the Bank needs to pay on these areas of emphasis. 16. Since the completion of ADF VII negotiations, the Bank has stressed the implementation and mainstreaming of its operational policies on cooperation with NGOs, incorporation of social dimensions in Bank operations, involuntary resettlement, assistance to the population sector, environmental considerations and procedures, role of women in development, and good governance. The Bank has also established a framework for mainstreaming participatory development processes into its operations. A critical review of the Bank's private sector operations was undertaken in 1998, leading to a strengthened strategy on private sector operations to be reviewed in 1999. And, as planned in 1998, major new or enhanced Bank policy initiatives were approved for the following areas of emphasis:
17. Protection of the Environment. Key steps were taken in 1997-1998 to develop measurable environmental performance indicators for Asian countries.4 Following further pilot tests in their application and measurement, these performance indicators will be used in regular environmental assessments of DMCs. In 1998, Bank assistance was provided to countries directly hit by the Asian financial crisis to assess the impact of the crisis on the environment; across all countries, more than 50 summary environmental assessment reports were prepared. Transboundary environmental issues were addressed at the subregional, regional, and global levels, including the problems of climate change and acid rain, and the impact of atmospheric haze caused by forest fires, the latter through collaboration with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and thorough coordination with bilateral and international organizations. 18. The Bank and NGOs. The Bank's updated policy, approved in 1998, recognizes the significant changes in the Bank and the NGO environment since the initial policy was approved in 1987.5 The Bank has since adopted an operational strategy that continues support for integrated, growth-oriented development projects and, in addition, strongly supports projects focused on human development, social development, and environmental protection. At the same time, the NGO sector has significantly strengthened its operational capacity and its role, impact, and influence in development processes have grown dramatically. The updated policy affirms that an expanded program of cooperation with NGOs in Bank operations should be pursued to strengthen the effectiveness, sustainability, and quality of development services that the Bank provides. The expanded program of cooperation identifies, in addition to loan and TA activities, operational programming and country-level work and policy development work, areas not explicitly envisaged in the 1987 policy. To facilitate closer operational relationships with NGOs, the Bank has started to significantly strengthen its internal capacity for NGO cooperation, through staff training, skills development, and other related activities. 19. Indigenous peoples. The Bank's new policy on indigenous peoples6 incorporates key elements to ensure equality of opportunity for indigenous peoples in development interventions and to ensure that Bank interventions affecting indigenous peoples are:
The policy also ensures that the process of initial social assessment mandated in Bank operations includes specific consideration of indigenous peoples as a potentially affected population. If an initial social assessment identifies indigenous peoples specifically as a significantly and adversely affected population, or vulnerable to being so affected, the policy ensures that an indigenous peoples plan is prepared by the government or other project sponsors. 20. Gender and Development. Since it first adopted a policy on the role of women in development (WID) in 1985, the Bank has progressed significantly to a gender and development (GAD) approach that allows gender to be seen as a cross-cutting issue influencing all social and economic processes.7 Thus, the Bank's revised policy, approved in 1998, adopts mainstreaming of GAD considerations into all Bank activities as a key strategy in promoting gender equity, including macroeconomic and sector work, and lending and TA operations. Accordingly, the Bank's focus of activities under the revised policy are to:
21. Anticorruption. With the approval in 1998 of a formal anticorruption policy,8 the Bank established the framework and joined an active fight to combat corruption, which has had notable adverse impacts on development. Specifically, the Bank's anticorruption policy is centered on three objectives:
Most of the Bank's effort is directed toward two components: first, seeking to reduce the scope of direct government intervention in an economy, on the conviction that markets are efficient, competitive, and have as few barriers to entry and exit as possible; and second, supporting improvements in public administration and public sector management, in the areas of management information systems, audit functions, procurement reform, civil service management, improved procedures for recruitment and promotion, and reengineering and streamlining of business processes. With regard to the Bank's internal policies and procedures, a policy update of the Bank's guidelines for procurement and introduction of anticorruption provisions in the Bank's guidelines on use of consultants were also approved in 1998. ___________________
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