Highly prone to natural disasters, the Kyrgyz Republic experiences an annual average of about 170 disasters, leaving many parts of the country severely damaged. ADB provided the Government a $5 million loan for this first emergency assistance project in September 1998.
In line with ADB's policy on Rehabilitation Assistance after Disasters (1989), the Project aimed to demonstrate poverty alleviation by bringing quick economic and social recovery to the affected regions of Jalal Abad, Osh, and Batken oblasts. It was designed to rehabilitate damaged public infrastructure and mitigate the risks to the Government's macroeconomic stabilization program brought about by the disaster-related expenditures.
The Project was evaluated against the outcome of restored economic activity in these regions bearing in mind seven output categories updated in the course of the evaluation:
- Rehabilitated roads and bridges
- Rehabilitated power transmission
- Rehabilitated healthcare facilities
- Rehabilitated water supply and sanitation systems
- Rehabilitated old schools and newly constructed ones
- Rehabilitated telecommunication centers
- Relocation centers for affected families
Summary of Findings
Thirty-nine subprojects were completed against 37 envisaged at appraisal. Sixteen subprojects were dropped from the original project scope while 18 new ones were added. Out of 34 subprojects inspected during the operations evaluation mission, 76% were rated good to fair, and 24% poor or destroyed. Subprojects in power and telecommunications performed best, while the worst performers were school and road subprojects.
- The Project was rated 'relevant'. ADB responded quickly to the Government to reconstruct or rehabilitate damaged infrastructure in affected oblasts, in keeping with the Kyrgyz Republic's objectives of mitigating the effects of natural disasters and that of ADB's Disaster and Emergency Assistance Policy.
- The Project was assessed 'effective' in achieving its outcome. Daily lives were brought to normalcy through rehabilitated roads and bridges, power and energy, water supply, schools, telecommunications, and new public facilities in relocation centers.
- Using a combination of 4 criteria (duration of construction, unit cost of construction, quality of construction, and number of beneficiaries), the Project was rated 'efficient'.
- Sustainability is assessed as 'less likely' in view of the generally weak maintenance regime, physical condition of the subprojects, and the geologically unstable areas where these subprojects are located.
- Overall, the Project was rated 'successful'.
Lessons Identified
- ADB's role in post-disaster operations needs to be focused on transitional emergency assistance if urgency is key and funding is limited. Such emergency interventions can address people's immediate needs (i.e., resettlement centers), and leave infrastructure rehabilitation to dedicated project loans which have realistic timeframe and adequate funding.
- Identifying the potentials for reducing response time is more useful in assessing the length of implementation period for disaster relief operations, rather than benchmarking the implementation period on the completion target determined at appraisal.
- Training selected executing agency staff in delay-causing areas like procurement, financing, and accounting procedures can shorten the implementation time.
- Disaster relief assistance cannot remedy deferred maintenance.
- Internalization of repair and maintenance expenditures in the Government's recurrent budget and local community mobilization can help in the upkeep of rehabilitated infrastructure.
- The country strategy and program phase can consider a special approach that will address preparations for, and the management of, recurrent natural disasters delegated to resident missions to implement, as necessary.
- Public education and awareness are keys to disaster protection.