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SWAps in the Water Sector - messages emerging from

the country studies

Draft June 27 2011

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• The state of policy frameworks was diverse when SWAps started -- SWAps offer “unique” opportunities to support policy development (Senegal), to consolidate policy and expand ownership (Burkina, South Africa, Uganda), to interpret policy (South Africa), and (rarely) to protect policy against political interference.

• SWAp has helped to create spaces for policy dialogue (to discuss new topics or old topics in a more structured way) and to include more sector actors in the dialogue (Senegal, Burkina, Jordan)

• There is evidence from the countries that the programmatic approach gives a better opportunity for external resources and actors outside of government lead agencies to contribute to policy, strategy and its implementation (strong donors can still do this outside of a SWAp – World Bank (Lesotho) if the time is ripe).

• However, in most cases policy dialogue has been less intense and of lower quality than predicted by “SWAp theory” (Uganda, Burkina, Senegal).

Policy - quality

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• SWAps can create a consensus about the need and direction of policy reform (Burkina, South Africa) which in some cases is more likely to work than a single donors adopting a policy pushing approach and use of conditionalities.

• The SWAp process helps to identify, although not always resolve, policy gaps – common examples are: sanitation roles, tariff setting, regulation (Uganda, South Africa, Jordan)

Policy - reform process

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• There is often a mismatch between the targets assigned to a sector and the financial resources made available to achieve those targets. SWAps have helped to identify this mismatch (by costing the objectives), but not to resolve the incoherence (Uganda).

• SWAps have proven better at improving internal cohesiveness of the sector than at ensuring coherence with policy domains in the border of the sector (e.g. agriculture) – (Uganda (WfP), Jordan)

Policy - coherence

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•While SWAps are centrally-driven, they often bring to the fore the importance of the local level in policy implementation and the need to support local governments to carry out their service delivery responsibilities. (South Africa)

• SWAps have also highlighted the need for a better alignment and coordinated roll-out of water policies and decentralisation policies (Uganda, South Africa).

Policy - decentralization

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•Most countries have clear service delivery targets (MDGs or more ambitious national targets) and the strong pressure to deliver may enter in conflict with sector development. (South Africa, Uganda)

• At the same time, due attention to sector development should not happen at the expense of ensuring progress on the ground.

• The real benefit of SWAps may not be so much in accelerated achievement of service targets, but in improving sector efficiency and sustainability.

Policy – the trade-off: service delivery / sector development

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• Donors should not lead the policy aspects of the SWAp – they rarely do – but they may need to step up to help maintain momentum when the government leadership weakens (Burkina)

• Donors should bring up policy issues, while being ready to accept that they are not taken on board (Senegal, South Africa, Burkina)

• Donors can also play an influential role by supporting those actors that act in the best interest of the sector in the long term (Jordan, Lesotho)

• Donors can help the sector to fend-off political interference in policy development and SWAps offer a way for articulating a common front (Senegal)

Policy - the role of donors

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•Most countries have a clear explicit or implicit financial model (how should the sector be financed), SWAps have not generally helped to refine it.

• SWAps have been generally successful in attracting additional donor funds, but not budgetary resources, and they have had little impact on user contributions (Uganda)

Finance - Financing model and financial resources

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• Some SWAps have helped to develop “sector budgets” (South Africa) or even model-based projections of financing gaps (Uganda, Lesotho), which have proven quite useful (e.g. for articulating needs vis-à-vis MoF)

• But the discussions have focused on the expenditure side, much less on the balance of sector revenues

• Financial sustainability of the sector is one major issue that has not received adequate attention in most SWAps (South Africa)

Finance - Strategic financial planning and financial sustainability

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SWAps have helped to improve the intra-sectoral allocation of financial resources – most headway has been done in terms of geographical allocation, not so much in terms of sub-sectoral reallocations, and less in correcting the bias towards new investments (vs O&M) (Uganda and South Africa)

Improved allocation is probably the major financing impact that can be expected of a SWAp

• Improved allocation requires paying early attention to supporting tools, such as local development plans and formulas for the allocation of resources

Finance - Allocation of financial resources

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• The programmatic approach /SWAps have forced sector actors to engage more intensely in the national budget process – in some cases the benefits are not evident in the short term, and some unexpected costs may arise, but in the long term is unavoidable

• Budget execution is probably the most significant bottleneck, requiring careful thought in the early stages of the SWAp

Finance - Budget planning and execution

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•Most SWAps use country systems, sometimes in a leap of faith, and while there may be teething problems, it puts the pressure on the country to develop and rely on its own systems.

• Capacity building for PFM and attention to financial information, monitoring and evaluation should be a critical component of any SWAp

Finance - Public financial management

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•Most SWAps have helped to improve value for money – through benchmarking, technological choices, reduced duplication and reform of subsidy policies

• Yet, SWAps seem to have paid less attention to value for money that what could be expected – partly due to the fact that the preoccupation has been mostly to spend the “new money”. This merits attention.

Finance - Value for money

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• Donor finance for SWAps has been critical for sector development and has generally allowed much needed flexibility

• Sector budget support needs to be accompanied by other forms of support – for instance to pilot innovative approaches that may be difficult to fit into the regular budget process, or to finance NGOs (Uganda, South Africa)

Finance - The role of donor finance

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• Restructuring sector institutions has led to incomplete change as old mandates are not abandoned and informal communication channels follow earlier arrangements (Jordan) In Uganda/ South Africa decentralisation accepted due to Ministry of Finance lead (but still tendency to reverse)

• Continuing weakness in civil service and wage reforms cannot be ignored when considering sector performance and productivity (Lesotho)

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Institutions - The process of reforms

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• The role of the private sector and civil society is increasingly recognised and appreciated and already yielding benefits to the sector – ( HWF - Jordan)

• SWAps can become government centric and thereby limit civil society and private sector participation. When funding for civil society flows through government, the advocacy role and independence of NGOs can be weakened (Uganda, South Africa)

• SWAps can threaten community-based operations, maintenance and ownership (South Africa)

• Private sector plays a role in construction, provision of parts and consulting, but more rarely as service providers even in South Africa.

Institutions - importance of non-state actors

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Institutions- Building capacity through projects

• Aligned projects working through government have the potential of creating effective results and building internal capacity (Lesotho)

• Project Implementation Units are suitable for mega projects that are unlikely to be repeated (Lesotho)

• Donor funds can inadvertently increase the distortion of mandates if projects that cut across institutional boundaries are wrongly anchored (Jordan)

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Institutions - SWAp and Innovation

• Some stakeholders find it difficult to innovate within SWAp – the support modalities can also be restrictive if they do not include projects to support innovation and civil society (Uganda)

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• Sanitation often fragmented with no clear lead agency – (MoU, Uganda, South africa)

•Water for production - water and agriculture (Uganda, Jordan)

Coordination - Fragmented parts of the sector

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• In the absence of a provincial/regional level, de-concentrated support structures have been established to provide support to districts and facilitate coordination. Some appreciate their support, others view then a unsustainable as they are not embedded in government and depend on external funding (Uganda)

• Tendency for re-centralising when progress is slow. ( Valley tanks - Uganda)

• Economy of scale for local operations (proliferation of districts - Uganda)

• Attracting and retaining skilled staff is a major issue impacting implementation, especially for rural districts (Uganda, South Africa)

Coordination - De-centralisation

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• When Government initiates SWAp, national ownership can be strong (South Africa, Uganda)

• Participatory sector coordination, with consultation and sector reviews can create a sense of belonging to a sector and mutual sharing (South Africa, Uganda)

• SWAps can become government centric and thereby limit civil society and private sector participation. When funding for civil society flows through government, the advocacy role and independence of NGOs can be weakened (Uganda, South Africa)

• Lead agency must embrace a consultative role in sector coordination. If a prescriptive approach is used, other stakeholder are unlikely to remain engaged (South Africa)

Coordination - Ownership and participation

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• When SWAp start as sub-sector SWAp and then expand to cover entire sector, new sub-sectors may remain on the back burner (South Africa, Uganda)

• Ministries with a role but not a core mandate in the sector can be difficult to engage actively, unless support is provided to them (South Africa, Uganda, Lesotho)

• Areas cutting across defined sectors or at the periphery of sectors risk being under-prioritised or sources of inter-ministerial conflict (Uganda, Jordan)

• Thematic sub-groups can be an effective way of handling specific topics. It is easier to engage other ministries in these than in overall sector coordination (Uganda)

Coordination - Central coordination

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• Strengthened coordination at regional can play a key role in enhancing capacity support and providing a conducive guidelines and procedures for local government (South Africa, Uganda)

• Coordination between local governments can provide a basis

for sharing and learning of best practices (South Africa)

Coordination – Decentralised coordination

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• Champions with a vision and commitment to the SWAP process can play a crucial role in ensuring progress, e.g. in difficult areas (Uganda, South Africa)

• Informal relations, coordination, and collaboration among a group of individuals from the sector can be a significant driver (South Africa)

• Changes in (senior) staff and leadership can significantly change the approach, inclusiveness, and overall progress of a SWAp (South Africa)

• Once a culture of sector collaboration is well established it becomes entrenched and remains (albeit at a lower level) even when SWAp process is off-track or the conducive environment is lost (South Africa)

• It can be difficult to maintain the drive and energy in a SWAp over a long time span, and progress may slow down (South Africa, Uganda)

Coordination - Leadership

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• Internal donor coordination can improve collaboration with government and enable donors to engage in discussions of difficult issues with Government (Uganda, Jordan)• Sector support can go through multiple routes (general BS, SBS, joint

partner funds, projects) and be supportive of SWAp as long as support is coordinated and aligned with sector plans (Uganda)• Support for SWAp should build on previous long-term presence in sector

(South Africa, Uganda)• Donors need staff with in-depth sector knowledge to effectively engage in

dialogue with Government (Lesotho, South Africa)• Donors can play a catalytic role in tackling difficult/contentious issues

(Uganda)• Coordination is more than meetings, and investment plan to which donors

can align are needed. Coherent, well-conceived, well coordinated sub-sector plans should be accepted if they form the basis for governments own funding (Lesotho)• A code of conduct for national bodies and donors help establish partnership

principles, alignment, and coordination and enhance info sharing (Jordan, Lesotho)

Coordination - Donors

SWAp triggers a strong need for more accountability• It is clear that Joint Sector Reviews play a fundamental role in triggering the need for

more accountability in the sector (Senegal)• This accountability is often managed as a communication tool to demonstrate the

willingness of the sector to engage in reforms (Burkina Faso) and therefore increase the number of potential donors in the sector (Senegal)

SWAp contributes to strengthening M&E systems• Planning and sophisticated financing tools such as SBS need to be fed with indicators

and also play a very important role in improving existing M&E systems, which face many structural problems in most countries (Senegal, Burkina Faso)

• SWAp encourages the sector to consider M&E as a process and a permanent activity that needs to be included in the resources of the sector (Burkina Faso)

• SWAp also has the effect of unlocking the financing problem: cost of running a M&E system is more clearly identified and can therefore be taken in charge by donors, for instance through a basket fund arrangement (Burkina Faso)

• When the PEPAM Unit was put in place in 2005, substantial efforts were made to update the quality of data which are now available online (Senegal)

• The preparation of the new M&E system to put in place in the framework of the PNAEPA led to new indicators, tools and cost sharing (Burkina Faso)

Monitoring & Evaluation

Horizontal dimension of M&E• The (annual) Joint Sector Review constitute a strong incentive to improve the

horizontal dimension of the monitoring and evaluation process and consider the sector as a whole. Progressively all subsectors are embedded in the same JSR process, including IWRM (Burkina Faso)

• SWAp can also have an impact on how the W&S sector is connected to other cross or multi-sector processes such as Poverty Reduction Strategies (Senegal)

Vertical dimension of M&E• While improving the M&E systems countries usually realize that there is a need to fill

the gap between national and local planning (Burkina Faso, Senegal)• New tools have been developed to fill this gap and progressively base all the

planning on a local process, which requires more resources and often exceeds the human resources that the local authorities can mobilize (Burkina Faso)

Specific issue around international vs. national M&E systems• There are some discrepancies between coverage figures produced at national level

(based on physical inventories) and JMP estimates (base on household surveys). In some cases (Burkina Faso) SWAp has led to innovative attempts to improve the link between the W&S sector and the national statistical office.

Monitoring & Evaluation