Poverty Reduction and Millennium Development Goals Acceleration Program

Well-conceived and structured TA associated with the program addressed the obstacles presented by system inefficiencies and limited capacity. Survey data and other forms of monitoring can be subject to local manipulation by incumbents and unintended beneficiaries. A related problem is rent-seeking in local agencies and the government can similarly distort monitored data, and misdirect public transfer payments and other benefits. This a recurring problem with targeting methods, so indirect measures such as proxies and district comparisons drawn from central government surveys are needed to corroborate or adjust direct monitoring.