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Lesson
Technical assistance with a narrow focus, immediate policy relevance, and carried out with national champions with financial and/or planning authority was key to the successful integration of climate technologies in country investment plans. Careful and realistic planning is required for the production and dissemination of outputs, since this involves multiple institutions within a given timeframe.

Project Number: No PN
Project Name: Climate Change Fund, 2008–2019
Report Date:
Lesson
Institutional capacity development on climate change in ADB’s DMCs requires long-term engagement. Just over half of CCF resources went toward capacity development. The lack of basic climate data, technical expertise, and qualified local staff in many DMCs means that some processes, especially baseline studies, vulnerability assessments, and cost–benefit analysis of mitigation and adaptation measures, have to be adjusted to reflect realities on the ground.

Project Number: No PN
Project Name: Climate Change Fund, 2008–2019
Report Date:
Lesson
The strategic oversight of funds is enhanced when their governance structure includes some form of third-party engagement. The original Board paper outlined the governance structure of CCF and included at its apex ADB and external financing partners, whose function would be to provide strategic direction to the CCF and to meet ADB for annual consultations and to review progress, administration, and the annual work program. Since there are no external financing partners, ADB sits alone at the apex of the governance structure.

Project Number: No PN
Project Name: Climate Change Fund, 2008–2019
Report Date:
Lesson
Clear delineation of country activities with transparent funding allocations in cross-border RCI TA projects involving several countries helps smooth implementation and increase project success. The transaction costs in cross-border RCI TA projects tend to be high both in terms of resources and the time required to achieve agreement among stakeholders in the participating countries. It takes much longer to negotiate and agree to a common proposal in a cross-border RCI TA project than in a usual TA project.

Project Number: No PN
Project Name: Regional Cooperation and Integration Fund, 2007–2019
Report Date:
Lesson
Active engagement of national stakeholders and ADB resident missions from the outset helps improve ownership and project success. The likelihood of success is greater when an RCIF TA project is designed with genuine consultation with concerned line ministries, national agencies, the private sector (if relevant), and ADB resident missions. Active engagement of in-country stakeholders helps ADB to identify binding constraints and solutions, and to internalize implementation challenges at the TA design stage. This makes clear the roles and responsibilities of each stakeholder.

Project Number: No PN
Project Name: Regional Cooperation and Integration Fund, 2007–2019
Report Date:
Lesson
Limited capacity of government staff should be considered in designing reform programs. The 34 policy actions for a crisis response operation stretched out the government’s capacity in absorbing a substantial reform agenda. Constraints to capacity were reflected in the delays in complying with the policy actions, in particular with the policy action on financial ratios, which resulted in waiver of this action.

Project Number: 43152-012
Project Name: Economic Support Program
Report Date:
Lesson
Reform prioritization and sequencing could lead to more durable results. A steady, step-by-step pace of reforms may be more suitable in the Tongan context, given prevailing capacity constraints. The process of implementing reforms takes time, especially for reforms that require specialized skills, such as those in PFM and those that are structural in nature; these types of reforms take time to implement and cannot be completed by a single quick-disbursing stand-alone program.

Project Number: 43152-012
Project Name: Economic Support Program
Report Date:
Lesson
In small island economies, fiscal consolidation measures should take into account the size of the public sector. The role and magnitude of the public sector in a small, island economy and sporadic wage increases for civil servants put pressure on recurrent expenditure. These make it difficult to manage fiscal expenditure over time. A small economic base limits areas for alternative employment opportunities. This could imply that the share of the public sector in the economy would remain large in the longer term.

Project Number: 46385-001
Project Name: Strengthening Public Financial Management Program
Report Date:
Lesson
Short-duration programs should consider time lags for policy actions. A program of short timeframe should adequately reflect the time lags that usually occur in implementing policy actions. It would be difficult for a short-duration program, even with up-front delivery of vital reforms, to achieve indicators involving external debt-togross domestic product, revenue mobilization, sustainable fiscal outturn, and improvements in Public Expenditure and Financial Accountability ratings due to time lags of these actions.

Project Number: 46385-001
Project Name: Strengthening Public Financial Management Program
Report Date:
Lesson
Political economy dimension of reforms should be considered to better assess feasibility of policy measures. The civil service strike highlighted the importance of communicating the full implications of proposed actions. It then becomes important to identify and understand the various groups affected by and opposed to the reforms in order to have better ideas on the need, magnitude, and practical considerations for possible mitigation or compensation measures. As such, there is a need for careful assessment of winners and losers, including addressing the concerns of losers.

Project Number: 33097-013
Project Name: Economic and Public Sector Reform Program
Report Date:
Lesson
Implementation is equally important. The reform process is ultimately about implementation. Although vital legislations were easily enacted within a short time period, concomitant implementing rules and guidelines, including changes in institutional arrangements entailed additional time for these to be put in place. As such, extra effort must be devoted during program preparation stage in considering the implementing mechanisms and the time needed for these to actually take effect.

Project Number: 33097-013
Project Name: Economic and Public Sector Reform Program
Report Date:
Lesson
Careful prioritizing of reform issues facilitate better sequencing and pacing of reform measures. Reform issues are often interrelated. As such, priority actions and measures should be established. Reform measures may require careful prioritizing, especially as these entail attendant sequencing and pacing considerations. Although ADB chose to focus on fiscal policy measures, public sector, and public sector enterprise reforms were also simultaneously tackled under the program.

Project Number: 33097-013
Project Name: Economic and Public Sector Reform Program
Report Date: