News and Events

Good afternoon!

First of all, on behalf of the Asian Development Bank, and particularly the Philippine Country Office of the ADB, I would like to thank Asian NGO Coalition for Agrarian Reform and Development and the NGO Forum on the ADB for giving us the opportunity to address this gathering of NGOs in Mindanao. We extend our most sincere wishes to this assembly, for much success in its efforts to draw up a successful agenda of strategies, measures and mechanisms for interaction with ADB and the World Bank to ensure the participation of all sectors of the public and civil society in our work and particularly for the socio-economic development of Mindanao.

In my presentation I will outline how ADB's overall framework and mission in the Asian region is incorporated to our strategy in the Philippines, and briefly describe the strategy and activities ADB has had in the Philippines in general, and in Mindanao in particular. I will then discuss ADB's framework and policies for cooperation with NGOs to help improve our joint efforts and ensure broader participation in ADB's projects and programs in the Philippines.

The ADB Charter mandates that ADB should promote economic development and regional cooperation within and among its developing member countries. Poverty reduction is the overarching goal of all ADB operations in all of its developing member countries.

• ADB's strategic development objectives, are to promote economic growth, reduce poverty, support human development (including population planning), improve the status of women, and protect the environment. With the adoption of its new Poverty Reduction Strategy on 9 November 1999, ADB has emphasized its poverty reduction mission.

ADB has had long development partnership with the Philippines:

• Over the past 31 years, ADB has provided 183 loans totaling $7.9 billion to support economic and social development programs and projects in the Philippines. This represents about 8.0 percent of ADB's total lending to its 38 borrowing developing member countries. Most loans have been provided to support energy, transportation, agriculture and social development programs and projects. Currently, 49 ADB loans with a total amount of $2.7 billion are being implemented in the Philippines. In addition to lending from its own resources, ADB has mobilized $4.4 billion Cofinancing resources from official and commercial sources for the Philippines.

• Complementary to its lending program, ADB has provided $117.4 million for technical assistance to the Philippines for project preparation, institutional capacity building, and policy studies. The technical assistance to the Philippines accounts for 6.04 percent of the ADB's total technical assistance to all its DMCs. Starting in 2000, ADB approved three Japan Funds for Poverty Reduction (JFPR) projects amounting to $4.8 million.

Based on a number of social and economic indicators, Mindanao is lagging the other regions of the Philippines such as Luzon and Visayas. In spite of this, ADB regards Mindanao as one of the regions with the greatest potential for economic development in the country. Given its history of civil strife, parts of the island have suffered from a lack of development. However, the new peace process provides an opportunity once again to revive Mindanao's development process.

ADB has been involved in development of Mindanao since the very beginning of its operations in 1960s. The $2.5 million loan for the Cotabato Irrigation Project approved in 1969 is among the very first few loans ever approved by ADB to its DMCs. Since then, ADB has provided 31 loans totaling $701.5 million exclusively for projects and programs located in Mindanao. The lending to Mindanao (not accounting for Mindanao components of nation-wide projects) accounts for nearly 10 percent of total ADB loans to the Philippines. If the Mindanao components are added this figure would increase significantly as in nation-wide projects, Mindanao is usually represented, being a major focus of assistance for the ADB. The Table in Appendix 2 gives a list of completed and ongoing projects in Mindanao.

ADB's Country Operational Strategy Study for the Philippines (COS) has focused on Mindanao development as a major goal for achieving balanced regional development in the country. In order to support sustainable growth with equity in Mindanao, the ADB COS focuses on the following areas:

1. the poors' increased access to infrastructure in rural areas;
2. promotion of agrarian reforms and rural growth;
3. improvement of human capital, particularly through investments in qualitative education for a better-equipped labor force;
4. support of peace-related initiatives in Mindanao; and
5. enhancement of institutional and planning capacities to harness partnership between the national government, local government, private sector, and non-government organization.

ADB's existing program continues to provide assistance and support for development of Mindanao, particularly in the near term. Of the 21 loans totaling $1,440 million programmed for the next 3 year rolling plan period, 4 loans totaling $235 million are being provided exclusively for development projects in Mindanao . The current 2001 program includes the Transmission Interconnection and Reinforcement Project ($100 million), Mindanao Basic Urban Services Sector Project ($45 Million), Mindanao Basic Education Development Project ($50 Million), and Mindanao Community-Based Forestry Resources Management Project ($40 Million). ADB is also helping to promote the involvement of the private sector to spearhead and accelerate economic growth in Mindanao, Palawan and other countries in the region through a strategy for the development of small and medium size enterprises (SMEs) in the BIMP-EAGA.

Underlying the strategy is the fact that ADB is the only MDB that is mandated by its Charter to use regional cooperation as a tool for economic development. ADB uses regional cooperation as a mechanism to promote the efficient use of resources in the sub-regions of a growth area.

In the southern part of its area of responsibility, ADB had provided assistance to facilitate regional cooperation in the Brunei, Indonesia, Malaysia, Philippines East ASEAN Growth Area, or BIMP-EAGA. The effort had been initiated in 1994 under the Ramos administration. ADB had provided assistance to develop a study on the East ASEAN Growth Area potential. However, the effort was stalled when the Asian crisis affected countries in the region in 1997. In order to revive regional cooperation in BIMP-EAGA, ADB sharpened the focus of its objectives by giving priority to poverty reduction through reviving private sector activity. The reason for this is that while regional cooperation efforts tend to focus on public sector participation, in the long-term, it is the development of the private sector that determines overall economic development.

It is in this context that end of 1999, the ADB commissioned a study to support SMEs in the Southeast Asian countries most affected by the Asian crisis. The primary goal of the activities to be carried out under the strategy is to reduce poverty in the targeted sub-regions by stimulating long-term economic growth and creating opportunities for employment.

The study was developed into a draft proposed strategy through a number of consultations and workshops held in Manila, in Mindanao and Palawan, as well as in Jakarta and in Kalimantan and Sulawesi between July and September 2000. During the workshops we consulted with over 500 people representing the local business communities, the regional and local governments, chambers of commerce, NGOs, professional, business and trade associations, and donor-funded economic development projects. These consultation workshops were encouraging, informative and resulted in the validation of the proposed strategy. A lot of ideas and suggestions came out of these consultations and were integrated in the final strategy. The draft proposed strategy for SME development was presented to a concluding workshop held in Jakarta in November 2000. The proposal was well received and was endorsed by representatives of the private sector, NGOs as well as delegates from the Governments of the Philippines and Indonesia. We now look forward to the initial steps to implement the proposed strategy in consultation and coordination with all of our development partners.

You may have noticed that although ADB has financed the preparation of this strategy, we make it a point not to call it the ADB strategy, but rather as the proposed strategy. The reason is simple but fundamental: Participation and ownership by the public sector, private sector, and the actors in civil society are necessary to make any such strategy succeed. ADB can prepare as many projects as it wants but they will end up as beautiful but useless studies on the shelves if those projects are ADB's only.

The ADB believes that cooperation with NGOs is an important part of its operations. Many of you may know that ADB has a formal policy in place that provides a framework for ADB's work with NGOs, and that ADB has been working to expand its cooperation with NGOs in many ways. Recently, a number of steps have been taken to better implement that policy. An NGO Coordination Unit has been established in our Office of Environment and Social Development with a staff of five, while every ADB Resident Mission - including the PhCO - is to have a designated NGO Coordinator for its area of responsibility. As to the PhCO, we are launching our Website in the next few weeks which, in addition to providing better transparency and information on all of our operations in the Philippines, will have a specific section for NGO operations and coordination and for inquiries.

Why this increased focus on NGOs and civil society? As I noted earlier, ADB has recently adopted a new operational strategy that holds poverty reduction as the overarching goal of ADB operations. ADB is pursuing other new policy initiatives, such as a stronger focus on governance and fighting corruption. In its project operations, ADB is strengthening its focus on participatory processes and stakeholder involvement. Each of these new directions in ADB's operations includes a specific emphasis on cooperation with NGOs and other civil society organizations. ADB recognizes that none of these new directions in our operations can be successful and sustainable without such cooperation.

A specific consideration in the design of ADB's poverty reduction strategy and the incorporating of that strategy into all projects and operations of ADB is the issue of the participation of people in poverty reduction efforts. This issue has been a key factor in the opening of ADB's development operations to include cooperation with NGOs and civil society organizations. In the past, the "conventional" approach to discussions of poverty and the design of poverty-focussed initiatives has been to bring together government representatives, representatives of development institutions like ADB, and academics dealing with development issues, to sit and discuss how the problems of "people" will be solved. What was missing in this kind of mix was the effective representation of the concerns, priorities, and views of the "people" that were being talked about. Maybe it took too long for ADB and others in the development community to realize this shortfall, but we have recognized it, and are taking steps to address it.

Participation is simply an issue of people being allowed to participate -- and people being empowered to participate - in the development processes that affect them. Processes that affect them both directly and indirectly. It is clear that to design effective and sustainable poverty reduction projects, cooperation between governments, development institutions, and people is critical. Experience has shown that development efforts that do not include the participation and ownership of people are doomed to failure. ADB recognizes that NGOs often hold definite comparative advantages in representing people and identifying development needs, and in designing and delivering effective programs that can truly reach people. Especially important is the fact that NGOs can represent alternative ideas and views in development, ideas and views that otherwise could be overlooked or ignored. NGOs can serve the vital role of intermediaries, between people on the ground, governments, and development institutions such as ADB. Admittedly, this is a relatively new direction in ADB's strategies and is an area where ADB has not always been effective. However, new efforts are in place to expand and strengthen cooperation between ADB and NGOs, on both an operational and policy level.

In summary, ADB wants you to be involved in our projects, programs, and policies. In fact, ADB needs your involvement to ensure the integrity and success of our operations in the Philippines, and particularly Mindanao. Making good our mission to achieve genuine poverty reduction, as well as to promote good governance and battle corruption, requires that NGOs, community organizations, and the people are at the forefront. You are here today as the representatives of a highly dynamic NGO community in Mindanao, and we expect to see and hear more from you. Why? Because we share a common objective: to make Mindanao again, for all of its people, a better place to live and prosper.

Thank you for giving me the opportunity to present these remarks, and again let me wish you a successful conference.