What‟s agricultural reform got to do with a Ministry of Agriculture?

Lunchtime Meeting Series

ODI, 25 November 2005

Peter Bazeley

peter.b@zeley.com

Context• Failure!

– Dismal – have to question the paradigm

– Insufficient (scope, scale) response to• technology

• institutions

• policy

• Concurrent processes of:• Aid effectiveness and

• Policy & institutional reform

SIPs, SWAps & PBAs as principal instruments (*)

• Agriculture - esp. pro-poor agriculture - not really making it in era of PRSPs, budgetary support, etc.,– Despite rhetoric, money

• Why not?

Substance and Process

• Substance– Not today

– Few big things since structural adjustment & liberalisation

– But (Dorward, Kydd & Poulton):• “Development Coordination”: technical, market &

institutional, and policy fixes

• More politically nuanced

• Interlocking local, national & international factors

• Link substance to process

Process

• Largely still (still!) talking SWAps (in practice)

• „Sector‟ deemed to = a Ministry– Boundaries

– Assumptions

– Capacity

• Approaches and instruments effectively = ends in themselves – Targets

– Time horizon (esp. donors)

• Much ado about financing

Agricultural SWAps• Haven‟t worked

– ct (?) Health, Education,

• Predictable reasons

• In particular, failure to capture:

– Non-agricultural determinants of agricultural productivity & growth

– Private sector

• Impatience: re-starts, re-orientations

• Process over substance

• Lowest common denominator

– Dev‟t Partners; Political & Admin Capacity; Pace

Determinants of agricultural livelihoods, productivity, growth

• Frequently fall outside mandate of core agriculture sector ministries

Malawi

1. Security

2. Markets / terms of trade

3. Capital

4. Infrastructure

5. Production technology

6. Land shortage / degradation

7. Weak institutions / policies

8. Irrigation & drainage

9. Business culture

Mozambique

1. Finance2. Roads3. Markets4. Technology5. Farmer

organisation6. Enabling

business environment

Uganda

1. Technology & information

2. Financial services

3. Markets4. Rural agric.

education5. Infrastructure6. Sustainable

natural resource utilisation

etc.

All these things ultimately determined by policies on (e.g.) …

• Land tenure & administration

• Subsidies, incentives & taxation

• Input and market interventions

• Public investment & services

• Energy and transport costs

• Exchange & interest rates

• Security & justice & contract enforcement

• Monopolies, monopsonies & corruption

• And they somehow need to be configured, balanced and sequenced across sectors for the purposes of achieving a particular outcome (agricultural productivity & growth) in one „sector‟

• Various attempts …

UgandaPlan for the Modernisation of Agriculture

• Reconfiguring governance of rural sector

(Originally, anyway)

• Led by Ministry of Finance

• Superimposed with decentralisation

Districts

Infra

struct

Rural

$$

H2O

Loc

GovLand

Agric

Law

FPED

PMA

Sectoral

Interpretations

$ € Sh

Sector

plans &

progs

- NAAS

- NARO

- etc.

Agricultural

Livelihood

RESULTS

$$$

$$$

Non sectoral policy

and investment forum

Production

Committees

Learning for

policy formulation

‘Rule Book’

Zambia“Enabling Environment for Business with a

Particular Emphasis on Agriculture”

• Capability of the private sector and civil society to demand better policy

• New „owners‟ of knowledge, information and process

• Management Unit located independently of major stakeholders (govt., private sector, civil society)

• Public-private trusts

KenyaStrategy for Revitalizing Agriculture

• Politically-endorsed cross-sectoral strategy

• 3 - 5 Ministries

– But still limited coverage

• Agriculture Sector Coordination Unit

– Questions – What, Where, Who, How

– Still no „hard‟ cross-sectoral coordination mechanism

• Work in Progress

Kenya GJLOSGovernance, Justice, Law & Order Sector

• Fresh start at cross-sectoral constraints and reforms

• Emphasis on novel cross-sectoral coordination mechanism, linked to priority-setting & allocation of resources via MTEF

• Political dimensions recognised & internalised

• New, parallel, non-statutory, institutions

GJLOS – MOVING FROM AN INSTITUTIONAL TO SECTOR-WIDE PERSPECTIVE

Adapted/simplified from: GJLOS MDA Strategic Plans, Administrative Data and Internal Reports

JUDICIARY

350 Professionals, 110 Courts,

2,700 Support Staff

293,000 cases

filed, 268,000 determined

TOTAL PENDING – 270,000

(Civil cases – 100,000)

PRISONS

Capacity 16,000, Occupancy 50,000,

- 48% remand, 39% petty offences,

13% > 3 years, Officer: Prisoner ratio

= 1:5, 5 out of 92 prisons for women

KENYA POLICE

Police: Population ratio = 1:10,

Reported crime rate: Population = 1:400;

10% of cases dismissed, 36% convicted,

47% awaiting trial

PUBLIC PROSECUTORS

53 counsel, 3,000 cases per annum

CIVIL LITIGATORS

37 professionals, 2,500-3,000 cases

per annum, 150 disposed

COMPLAINTS COMMISSION

12 professionals

13,000 pending complaints

2,000 complaints lodged, 1,000 disposed,

per annum.

PUBLIC TRUSTEE

40 staff, 12 offices, 47,000 accounts,

KShs 40 billion paid pa

LEGISLATIVE DRAFTING

12 professionals (3 trained),

Current workload – 50 laws

TREATIES & AGREEMENTS

17 professionals - TREATIES, CONTRACTS

REGISTRAR-GENERAL

39 lawyers

PROBATION AND AFTER-CARE

250 professionals, 90 stations,

Typically, 12,000 probation orders

or 40 orders supervised per staff

COMMUNITY SERVICE ORDERS

3 full-time staff, use Probation staff

55,769 order in 2004 or ratio

of 1 staff per 223 CSOs

PROVINCIAL ADMINISTRATION

10,000 field staff, 11,000

units

ADMINISTRATION POLICE

18,000 officers, 11,000

units

CHILDREN SERVICES

670 staff, 1 Children’s Court

NATIONAL YOUTH SERVICE

2,200 staff; 6,800 servicepersons

1,500 annual throughput

MoJCA (COORDINATING MINISTRY)

GJLOS GOVERNANCE FRAMEWORK

Inter-Agency Steering Committee

(Cabinet-level Committee)

Technical Coordination Committee

Executive Stakeholder Forum

TCC Management Sub-Committee

THEMATIC GROUPSGJLOS MDAs

(Ministries, Departments

& Agencies)

GJLOS-DG

(Donor Group)

Programme

Coordination

Office

Financial Management

Agency (BASKET

DONORS ONLY)

Civil

Society

Forum

Private

Sector

Forum

Adapted/simplified from: GJLOS Presentation

MTEF

• Not just a spreadsheet

• Cross-governmental statement of medium term priorities and actions

• Point where govt policy is translated into accountable action

• Meeting of top-down & bottom-up planning

– But critical elements are above sector ministries

• Fundamental to contemporary PFM & aid instruments

Strategic Budget Framework

Statement of government objectives & priorities

Analysis of cross-cutting issues

Macro fiscal framework

Analysis of inter sectoral resource allocation issues

Sector resource ceilings

Sector MTEF strategies

Programme resource allocation

Identification of new efficiency measures

Review of expenditure programmes

Resource implications of sector policies

Construction of MTEFs

Happens

above

sector

ministries

Happens

within

sector

ministries

Source: Adapted from ‘Training for Development’

MTEF (cont.)

• Isn‟t this above-line stuff what we‟re trying to achieve?– But we all work below the line

• Agriculture sector generally poorly represented in MTEFs– Incremental budgeting

• Inability to pitch high enough

• Assumptions about where authority lies– Delegation to sector ministries

Ponderings

• Ability to harness, balance and reconfigure resources and policies across governmentis what we‟re lacking

• Sectoral ministries don‟t have the necessary cross-sectoral clout

• Agriculture sector woefully bad at engaging with contemporary policy and financing instruments

Ponderings (2)

• Capacity to do anything beyond coping?

• Validity of covering transaction costs of change; of moving from State A to State B

– Non-statutory, parallel institutions

• Can we go overboard on „ownership‟ if political & top management commitment is already strong?

Ponderings (3)

• Vision & strategy has to outlive short political and donor cycles

– In absence of solid evidence

• Accept that agricultural outcomes will be negotiated outcomes, in highly politicised environment

– People and instruments for that

• Political & administrative impatience