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Results Matter June 2007
Progress Report on MFDR in ADB
By Bruce Purdue, Head, SPRU
President Kuroda with developing member country representatives during
the Third Round Table on MFDR in Ha Noi, February 2007Since adopting the Revised Action Plan on Managing for Development Results
(MfDR) in August 2006, the Asian Development Bank (ADB) has continued to take
action under each of the three pillars of the MfDR agenda. Departments and offices
are clearly assuming greater ownership in mainstreaming MfDR. Some highlights
under each pillar of the MfDR agenda are set out below.
Pillar 1: Support the Capacity of Developing Member Countries (DMCs)
to Manage for Development Results
- All regional departments are pursuing country-level dialogue on MfDR, often
through the programming process or as part of portfolio reviews, and using
new instruments to do so. These include country partnership strategies (CPSs)
and pilot CPS completion reports, as well as via country portfolio review
missions (CPRMs).
- The Economics and Research Department continues to pursue statistical capacity
building focusing on DMCs in greatest need, through a technical working group,
a desk study, and a concept paper for a fund for Asia-Pacific Statistical
Capacity Building, which aims to provide grants to improve statistical systems.
- The ADB-sponsored Community of Practice on MfDR (http://cop-mfdr.adb.org)
has clearly emerged as a most important and innovative initiative in helping
build sustainable MfDR capacity in participating DMCs.
- The Central Operations Services Office (COSO) continues to pursue an ambitious
program to help train staff at executing agencies and resident missions, including
facilitators, in improved results techniques at the project level.
- ADB co-sponsored a results-based monitoring and evaluation training program
at the Asian Pacific Development and Finance Center in Shanghai. Staff from
the Operations Evaluation Department and the Results Management Unit (SPRU)
presented ADB’s experiences in MfDR and evaluation to 75 practitioners
from the People’s Republic of China and Philippines.
Pillar 2: Enhance ADB’s Results Orientation
- All CPSs are results based. The CPS business processes had been completed
and revised guidelines were issued in February 2007.
- New CPS completion reports have been designed and are now being pilot-tested
to coincide with the conclusion of ADB’s first generation of results-based
country strategies and programs.
- SPRU is working with regional departments and COSO to focus on the linkages
between the findings in CPRMs and the next CPS.
- In most cases, regional departments are adopting improved project filters,
encouraging staff training in MfDR, using management information systems to
better capture inputs and outputs, employing their action plans for improving
the use and quality of design and monitoring frameworks, and considering MfDR
issues at departmental retreats.
- Innovations in individual regional departments also demonstrate mainstreaming
efforts. (Please see the box at the left for more information.)
- Human Resources and SPRU have invested considerable effort into the design
and implementation of an MfDR learning and development curriculum, which targets
all ADB staff.
- An increased results orientation—in the form of results matrices,
use of indicators, reporting on progress, and so on—is emerging in such
reports as the Poverty Reduction Strategy Annual Report and the Reform Agenda,
as well as in the Work Program and Budget Framework.
Pillar 3: Maintain Effective Results Partnerships
- The Multinational Development Banks’ Common Performance Assessment
System (COMPAS), which ADB spearheaded and largely developed in 2005–2006,
has been acknowledged as an important contribution to assessing the readiness
for MfDR of each major multilateral development bank.
- ADB successfully co-sponsored the Third International Roundtable on MfDR,
convened in Ha Noi in February 2007.
- ADB shared its experiences on MfDR with Latin American countries in Tokyo
in mid-April, and again with the World Bank staff in late April in Thailand.
-
President Kuroda chats with members of the Community of Practice on MfDR at the Third Roundtable on MfDR in Ha Noi
- The Southeast Asia Department employs interesting results-based techniques
in regional planning: the Greater Mekong Subregion: Regional Cooperation
Strategy and Program Update 2007–2009 includes an updated results
framework that contributed to strengthening of the synergy between CPSs
and the GMS program.
- The Central and West Asia Regional Department is developing mechanisms
to ensure high-quality country partnership strategies, as MfDR has become
a key focus of CWRD operations in 2007.
- The South Asia Regional Department has developed sector results profiles
for all sectors in its operations in developing member countries to enhance
measurement, monitoring, and reporting on results at the sectoral level.
It will also introduce an annual report on achievements in terms of development
results.
- The East Asia Regional Department is currently in discussions with the
China National Audit Office regarding performance audits to assess the economy,
efficiency, and effectiveness of government-sponsored projects and institutions.
Results and findings will be compared with targets and benchmarks as identified
in the 11th Five-Year Plan, as well as with the specific mission, vision,
values, or goals of project sponsors.
Excerpted from the Third Progress Report to Development Effectiveness Committee
of the Board
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