PRSPs and Rural Development:reflections, experiences to date and

implications

Felicity Proctor

DFID-WB Collaborative Program for Rural Development

4 – 6 September 2002

Broad agreement on the PRSP process

• Widespread and growing sense of ownership and commitment amongst governments to the process and objectives

• Process has created a more open dialogue• Poverty reduction has a more prominent position

in policy dialogue• Donor community has embraced the principles

with stronger partnerships with countries and improved donor coordination

• Over 60 low income countries are now engaged in the PRSP process

Progress to date: Generic observations

• Importance of country driver and ownership of process

• Flexibility to allow for different country starting points

• Importance of open and transparent process

• Requires a sustained and long term effort

• Need to improve:– realism in setting goals and targets

– effective management of expectations globally and locally

– understand linkages between policy and poverty outcomes

– prioritization of policies and programs to facilitate implementation

– need for debate on policy alternatives

What can we learn from rural coverage of selected PRSP completed to date?

WB review based on WB-IMF Joint Staff Assessment Guidelines for the PRSP i.e. participation; poverty diagnostics; targets and indicators; and priority public actions

Selected full PRSPs reviewed:Africa: Uganda, Tanzania, Burkina Faso,

Mauritania, Mozambique, Niger, Guinea, Zambia and Gambia

Latin America: Honduras, Nicaragua, and Bolivia

Building country ownership through rural participation

• PRS process led by a central Ministry• Extensive participatory processes undertaken but not

much is reported on rural stakeholders participation • Rural ministries, NGOs and donors involved through

formal and ad-hoc consultations, and working groups • Rural community groups and private sector involved

mainly through regional consultations• Numerous rural issues raised during consultations,

but not always systematically reported• References to linkages with on-going rural strategies -

little reported about what the PRSP process adds

Rural poverty diagnosis - profile

• Countries with sound HH surveys have strongest rural poverty profiles

• Emphasis on measures of income poverty from HH surveys- Most countries have at least one survey but fewer able to estimate

trends- Limited in some cases to Rural-Urban only breakdowns- Limited disaggregation by gender, land holding etc- Little information on sources of income, land assets and

participation in markets

• Focus on agriculture and infrastructure, limited coverage of non-farm incomes and rural financial assets

• Weak qualitative and quantitative linkages/analysis

Rural poverty diagnosis - determinants

• All PRSPs highlight geography as a factor behind persistent poverty

• Many groupings too large or heterogeneous to be of real value for policy

• Brief assessment of distributional impacts of past rural programs and policies– Weak information on transmission mechanisms between growth and

HH economic welfare/poverty reduction

• Multiple rural poverty determinants identified but not always prioritized (done for BF, Nicaragua, and Mozambique)

Rural poverty diagnosis – determinants

Some examples of economic determinants:- Farm income (half)- Issues relating to agricultural productivity (most)- Land access and security of tenure (half)- Non farm and labor markets (some)- Limited access to physical assets (most)- Limited access to financial services (some)- Market and market linkages (few)

Some omissions?- Social capital- Housing assets

Rural determinants of poverty: human development

Rural health and nutrition 8 out of 12 PRSPs

Urban bias in health expenditure Mozambique, Burkina Faso

Rural malnutrition Tanzania, Honduras, Mozambique

HIV/AIDS in rural areas Raised in only two PRSPs – Tanzania and Uganda

Poor rural education outcomes associated with limited access (including for women)

8 out of 12 PRSPs

(women -Mozambique)

Low quality of rural education Zambia

Targets and indicators for rural poverty reduction

• Most targets and indicators for rural space relate to poverty rate, and productivity and growth goals

however strategic interventions focus mainly on access to human and physical assets

• Whilst most PRSPs have some indicators for rural space (human and physical assets, vulnerability and social protection, non-farm income) they do not always have quantified targets, and are not easily quantifiable or monitored

Rural indicators and targets identified - examples

• Education and health targets (5 countries from 12)

• Access to physical assets incl. rural roads (7)

• Rural domestic water (9); electricity (5); communications (1)

• Agricultural Productivity (4); R&E (4); irrigation (3)

• Land access including titling (5)

• Micro-credit (4)

• Rural house plots (2)

Priority public actions to reduce rural poverty

• PRSPs propose mostly investment oriented actions, not policy or institutional reforms targeted at the rural poor

• Institutional framework for implementation not always clear

• Difficult to assess pro-poor focus of most actions proposed

• Rural public actions are weakly prioritized or sequenced; explicit criteria on selection of actions are not provided

• Most PRSP provide multi-year costing, but difficult to assess adequacy of budget

• Broad consistency between indicators and public actions, and poverty diagnosis and public actions but linkages not explicitly addressed

Costing of rural action plan

Detailed plans: some have full 3 or 5 year plans e.g. Honduras, Niger, Burkina Faso. Others not spatially disaggregated or one liners e.g. Zambia, Guinea

Partial costing: e.g. Uganda extension, capacity building for micro-finance

Financing gap: Rural infrastructure, land tenure – Bolivia

Lack of clarity: recurrent or investment budget e.g. Mauritania

Key overarching messages• Rural development is a priority sector in all PRSPs for

poverty reduction and economic growth objectives• Most emphasize priority public actions, less on other

core elements• Lack of systematic and consistent approach in

addressing rural poverty issues - public actions do not clearly flow from diagnosis and are weakly linked to outcome and impact indicators

• Heterogeneity of the rural poor is not well addressed• PRSP process may not be adding value to existing rural

development programs and strategies?• Extent to which support to RD is pro-poor remains

unclear?

Implications for EC and Member States - generic

Donor action in support of PRSP and rural development

Participatory process• Engage at all levels without undermining national

ownership• Provide timely feedback to the national PRSP

teams• Support capacity building of Rural Ministries and

rural based civil society to build local engagement into the process

Donor action in support of PRSP and rural development

Diagnosis, targets, indicators and M&E• Contribute to efforts to ensure rural dimension in

poverty analysis, and PSIAs• Support timely analytical work on rural issues up-

stream of PRS processes and action plans• Build capacity for development and use of

effective M&E systems for rural development at all levels

Donor action in support of PRSP and rural development

Clarify priority public actions• Support policy and analytical work and the debate of

policy options• Deepen efforts to understand linkages between rural

poverty diagnostic, and poverty outcomes including pro-poor growth

• Support line ministries in the preparation of national rural development strategies

• Validate and share good rural development practice globally and nationally

Donor action in support of PRSP and rural development

Public Expenditure Management• Support rural ministries in costing priority public

actions for effective participation on PEMs and MTEF

• Align processes of donor dialogue and programming with national cycles

• Encourage delineation of spatial allocations in PEMs

Donor action in support of PRSP and rural development

Donor alignment and harmonization • Foster dialogue at national and global levels – OECD

DAC; Global Forum; national donor fora etc• Explore further rural sector investment programming

instruments• Encourage Country Consultative Groups to include

rural development on the agenda and actively support dialogue

• Reduce duplication of effort and minimize application of conflicting approaches

Are PRSPs the right tool to address rural poverty?

YesLevel of rural poverty and inequalityCurrent global effort and donor/country consensus…..ButSigns that rural development is receiving less than

adequate attention - can this be reversed?Externalities must also be tackledWill the sums add up? Are the development options available?PRS process - not applicable/planned for in all countries

but principles apply to all national processes

End note

The implementation phase of the PRSP process has yet to be fully tested

Need to develop post PRSP guidelines: clarify roles of different agencies; refine rules of the game; address externalities

Development partners interested in rural development need to increase level of engagement at all levels