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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
Policy actions must be formulated in a manner that does not leave room for ambiguity or interpretation of supported policy principles. A large number of policy actions under PSDP were not sufficiently defined to ensure or help ascertain the achievement of meaningful results.

Project Number: 33314-013
Project Name: Federated States of Micronesia: Private Sector Development Program
Report Date:
Lesson
Public enterprise reform in the FSM requires creative approaches to involving the private sector in the management of public assets given limited private sector capacity and interest. The effort to reform and divest public enterprises has not been as successful as hoped. One reason is that in such a small and remote lower-income country with a weak private sector, there are few people with the capital or business experience to bid for or successfully manage such enterprises.

Project Number: 33314-013
Project Name: Federated States of Micronesia: Private Sector Development Program
Report Date:
Lesson
Ascertaining legislative support at both the national and state levels is an important aspect of determining project readiness in the FSM. The unexpected delays in obtaining national and state legislative authorization delayed the loan approval and loan effectiveness, each by 1 year, respectively. Reform momentum was lost during the long interval between appraisal and program inception.

Project Number: 33314-013
Project Name: Federated States of Micronesia: Private Sector Development Program
Report Date:
Lesson
IT-related project components need extra attention from ADB in small, remote countries with low capacity. From the start, the IT components for the land management administrations and FSMDB were not properly scoped and resourced. They did not adequately consider the limited capacity of internal IT departments and local IT providers. They also failed to address such related problems as the need to provide implementation support throughout the first year of operation.

Project Number: 33314-013
Project Name: Federated States of Micronesia: Private Sector Development Program
Report Date:
Lesson
Program implementation arrangements in the FSM need to recognize the limited authority of a program implementation unit at the national level over state administrations.

Project Number: 33314-013
Project Name: Federated States of Micronesia: Private Sector Development Program
Report Date:
Lesson
Consider targeting support for reform initiatives in the FSM at individual states. Decentralized practices among the four states (Chuuk, Kosrae, Pohnpei, and Yap) make coordination and communication on policy issues a challenge. This challenge was compounded by the weak capacity of various implementing agencies and different views and levels of political commitment regarding the reform agenda. These resulted in varying degrees of performance.

Project Number: 33314-013
Project Name: Federated States of Micronesia: Private Sector Development Program
Report Date:
Lesson
A design and monitoring framework can be an effective instrument to attain results only if it is properly shared with implementing agencies and provides clear performance targets with appropriate timelines, monitoring mechanisms, and baseline data. Sufficient resources and time should have been allocated for consultation with implementing agencies in determining program inputs, outputs, and outcomes, as well as in setting and monitoring performance targets.

Project Number: 33314-013
Project Name: Federated States of Micronesia: Private Sector Development Program
Report Date: