Integrated Local Development Project (ILDP)

Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina

TOWARDS BETTER LOCAL DEVELOPMENT PLANNING AND MANAGEMENT IN BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA

Country context

• Considerable progress made, moving from post-war recovery to a “potential candidate” for European Union membership;

• Significant challenges still confront Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH): cumbersome governance structure, considerable poverty and a widened development gap among different regions.

Local governance in BiH

• 144 local governments in BiH;

• “Monotype” local governments: same rights and responsibilities, regardless of great differences in terms of population size, type (rural or urban), etc.

• Complex legal framework, ill-defined responsibilities, unfunded mandates;

• Insufficient capacities of local governments to effectively and efficiently manage local development and service delivery to citizens.

Strategic planning framework in BiH

• Legal and policy framework related to strategic planning not defined (only general responsibility of various government levels to develop strategies);

• Emerging country planning system: development strategies at all government levels;

• Local planning level most advanced in terms of participatory strategic planning (> 80 % of local governments with local strategies).

ILDP first phase at glance

Goal: Support to modernisation and systematisation of local development planning in BiH.

Components:

• Creation and anchoring of standardised local development planning approach for BiH;

• Capacity development and practical application of the methodology at the local level;

• Engage civil society in the creation, application and monitoring of local development policies.

Duration: 2007 - 2011

Partners: BiH MHRR, FBiH MoJ, RS MALSG, both AMCs

Budget: USD 3,130,000

Policy-making process

Participatory policy-making process aiming to create and institutionally anchor a standardised methodology for local development planning in BiH.

Results of policy-making process

The standardised local development planning methodology for BiH.

Policy concept note on the guiding principles, features and standardised approach to local development planning in BiH;

• Local planning methodology officially supported by both Entity Governments and Presidencies of AMCs and recommended for practical use to all local governments in BiH (late 2009);

• Standardised local development planning methodology = a blueprint for local planning country-wide;

• Local strategic planning tool to guide local development processes and better prepare local governments for successful absorption of EU pre-accession/other funds;

• Broad public awareness and ownership over the process created country-wide.

Results of policy-making process

ILDP logic architecture

Policy making

New policy vision,

principles and elaboration of a standardised

local development

planning methodology in

BiH

1Institutionalisa

tion and promotion,

anchoring of the standardised methodology

2

Lessons learnt

4

Pilot Application at the municipal level & Capacity

Building

3

Supporting local governments and their communities

Project outreach:

• 24 partner local governments (4 extremely underdeveloped, 9 underdeveloped and 11 developed);

• Total population size and outreach via the results of the planning process: approximately 300,000 people.

Supporting local governments and their communities

• Support to integrated and participatory local development planning in 24 local governments, based on the standardised methodology;• Support to realisation of

local priorities originating from local strategies.

Results from the local level work

• Development strategies for 20 % of BiH local governments created: encompassing social, economic and environmental aspects of development and vertically aligned with the strategies of higher government levels;

• New quality dimension in local development planning and management, enabling replicable, sustainable and systematic local planning country-wide.

• Substantial impact at the local level in terms of improving quality of life for local communities by providing basic social and economic infrastructure and enhancing local human capital endowments and capacity of civil society in partner municipalities.

Voicing out communities

• Actively engaging local communities into the strategic planning process;

• Support to realisation of initiatives of grass-root organisations voicing out socially excluded and vulnerable groups.

Results from the local level work

• Transparent and socially inclusive local planning processes in partner municipalities, more than 1,300 citizens formally engaged into community policy-making bodies that validated integrated strategies, while capacity and advocacy skills of 23 community-based organisations were strengthened;

• Via small-scale projects, interests and needs of socially excluded and vulnerable groups voiced out and embedded into all adopted local development strategies.

Lessons learnt – “transmission belt” for the

ILDP II

• Vertical linkages between local and higher government levels` strategies and budget processes non-existent, leaving substantive policy vacuum ;

• Capacities of local governments to transform the development strategies into concrete actions remain insufficient;

• Consistent actions needed to integrate the local planning level into the planning and financial frameworks of higher government levels, as well as to strengthen the local development management capacity of local governments, so as to ultimately enable more effective implementation of local strategies and development results for their communities.

ILDP II at glance

Goal: Further support to vertical consolidation and horizontal systematisation of local strategic planning in BiH;

Duration: 2012 – mid 2015;

Partners: BiH MHRR, FBiH MoJ, RS MALSG, both AMCs; 40 BiH local governments and 2 FBiH cantonal governments;

Budget: USD 5.1 M.

ILDP II at glance

By 2014, local strategic planning system in BiH is further consolidated by enhancing its vertical integration with higher government planning frameworks, up-scaling its coverage country-wide and

strengthening local governments and their socio-economic partners’ development capacities.

Support integrated and participatory local strategic planning and management and

strengthen development partnerships

Policy dialogue

and support to

vertical integration

Technical assistance

to key institutional

partners

Strategic planning

at the FBiH

cantonal level

Financial mechanisms to support

local development

Further harmonisation

of local development

planning

Effective implemen-

tation of local development

strategies

Inter-municipal coopera-

tion

Support vertical integration of the local strategic planning system into the country strategic

planning framework

ILDP II territorial coverage

ILDP II features

• An intervention, which builds “EU-like” structures and processes;

• Uniquely positioned, system-building intervention in BiH (strategic planning);

• Country-wide field presence, not just at the local, but also at the cantonal level;

• Integrated strategies within 40 local governments, which may be seen as entry-point development platforms for further building on projects` efforts from various sectors` viewpoint;

• Inter-municipal cooperation.