Comprehensive options assessments provide an instrument for more inclusive consideration of all alternatives earlier in the planning cycle. Comprehensive options assessment requires an enabling planning environment, particularly at policy and strategic planning levels. To be implemented, there is a need for capacity building, including more information on alternatives, inter-sectoral cooperation, participatory processes, and ranking and screening tools.
The implications for funding and budgets are that comprehensive options assessments increase up-front costs in order to reduce longer term costs associated with delays and conflict; that small-scale, dispersed options require access to micro-credit for implementation; and that public resources will need to be devoted to options assessments at planning levels within and across each sector.
The comprehensive options assessment process will also need to be formalized in legal and regulatory frameworks.
The following key issues, which may be both obstacles for OA implementation and triggering factors need to be addressed:
- governance systems, in terms of transparency and accountability;
- extent that country legal systems enable effective consultation procedures;
- influence of donor policies and access to funding;
- regulatory structures and reforms as regards the participation of private sector;
- NGOs as regards their ability to analyse and contribute to OA, facilitate debate and promote community options;
- the physical context that can limit some options but trigger other creative initiatives;
- compartmentalized knowledge that reduces understanding of options, introduces bias and impairs transparency of process; and
- the needs and problems of indigenous communities acting as options promoters.
- lack of information or incomplete information on one option compared to others;
- influence of models that are either overly complex or too simple to convince stakeholders to accept their results;
- cost and time required for data collection; and
- assessment tools, such as models, that can facilitate better and deeper understanding of the comprehensive options assessment process and pave the way to incorporate and disseminate the methodology or, because of lack of familiarity with models and tools, and of willingness to apply them, generate the reverse reaction.
Other considerations relevant to comprehensive options assessments include.
Linkages between levels: it is recognized that there are many interactions between the policy, strategic planning and project levels.
Data needs: A knowledge base is required as a reference tool to raise awareness on what each of the various options can deliver, including the opportunities they present and their limitations.
Funding requirements: Financial assistance may be required at an early stage to improve the knowledge base on traditional initiatives. Where external support is required, the importance of strategic options assessment needs to be reflected in country assistance programmes.
Timeframes and short-term needs: The needs assessment process should be recognised as a discrete step in the process. Planning processes are dynamic and there should be a recognition that policies and strategies are updated periodically along different timeframes to strategic and project planning processes. Projects that satisfy agreed immediate short term needs can be implemented in parallel to longer-term strategy development.
The need for institutional and capacity building: To remove any bias created by imbalances in political and financial influence, there is a need to level the playing field by creating a transparent process where all stakeholders have an equal opportunity to influence the decision. This may require:
- Building the capacity of weaker stakeholders so that they are empowered to participate in the process.
- Reducing the institutional disincentives for government officials to engage in cross-sectoral exchanges.
- Enabling multi-stakeholder participation upstream in the decision-making process, and bringing policy-making closer to grass roots level.
Moving from a single sector approach to planning to an options assessment process that reflects cross-sectoral realities will require new approaches and institutional capacity. As part of this learning process, research and feedback on traditional and new options needs to be enhanced.
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