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Lesson
Coordinated use of TA is essential to support policy based lending, as this modality on its own is not well positioned to develop or deploy needed capacity. The TA grants funded by the Government of Canada provided the hands-on support necessary to develop policy and operating systems, which was followed by the program to provide the leverage to support the actual rollout of the JobStart Philippines Program (JSP).

Project Number: 49117-002, 49117-003, 49117-004
Project Name: Facilitating Youth School-to-Work Transition Program (Subprograms 1, 2, and 3)
Report Date:
Lesson
Depending on the public employment service office , it can take a long time to refer the beneficiaries to employers and during this idle time, some lose interest or can no longer be reached. Minimizing this gap between program completion and placement is important to reduce transition losses.

Project Number: 49117-002, 49117-003, 49117-004
Project Name: Facilitating Youth School-to-Work Transition Program (Subprograms 1, 2, and 3)
Report Date:
Lesson
While customized, survey-based performance targets can be useful, they should not account for the bulk of the targets such that the overall outcome of the program depends simply on one’s ability to replicate the survey. In this case, 4 of 6 outcome targets were generated by custom surveys which, for reasons unknown, could not be replicated. Also, proxy data could not be located for three of the targets. Thus, the program’s effectiveness, despite evidence to the contrary, was compromised simply by a lack of data and an inability to confirm progress.

Project Number: 49117-002, 49117-003, 49117-004
Project Name: Facilitating Youth School-to-Work Transition Program (Subprograms 1, 2, and 3)
Report Date:
Lesson
More formal and comprehensive systems, supported by the TA, are needed to track and validate compliance with gender-based performance targets. The first two subprograms were classified effective gender mainstreaming, and subprogram 3 was classified gender equity as a theme. Explicit targets were set to prioritize women in multiple areas, including entry into labor activation programs and training, and covering both job seekers and government staff. Yet, tracking was less than robust and required significant follow-up to evaluate program performance.

Project Number: 49117-002, 49117-003, 49117-004
Project Name: Facilitating Youth School-to-Work Transition Program (Subprograms 1, 2, and 3)
Report Date:
Lesson
Programmatic approaches are an appropriate and effective means to address technically challenging development problems that require long gestation periods. In this case, the government piloted and launched a highly effective program to improve the prospects of young and disadvantaged job seekers, and strengthened several existing labor market activation programs as part of a broader education reform agenda. This process covered more than 6 years and the large technical assistance (TA) grants the program attracted were instrumental to its success.

Project Number: 49117-002, 49117-003, 49117-004
Project Name: Facilitating Youth School-to-Work Transition Program (Subprograms 1, 2, and 3)
Report Date:
Lesson
Labor market activation programs, while effective in addressing specific constraints, are not a substitute for sound education policy, quality primary and secondary education, and tertiary education that is both relevant and effective. It is much more difficult to develop, standardize, launch, and institutionalize labor market activation programs as compared to improving the existing education system which already has a nationwide capacity and reach.

Project Number: 49117-002, 49117-003, 49117-004
Project Name: Facilitating Youth School-to-Work Transition Program (Subprograms 1, 2, and 3)
Report Date:
Lesson
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.

Project Number: 40003-013
Project Name: Poverty Reduction and Millennium Development Goals Acceleration Program
Report Date:
Lesson
The complication arose from the government’s decision, during SP2, to inject the other half of the anticipated policy output units into the subprogram, by extending it by another 5 months. This put considerable work and budget pressure on the project team. And that may have been a factor in the inability to fully achieve several output actions in time for this report.

Project Number: 40003-013
Project Name: Poverty Reduction and Millennium Development Goals Acceleration Program
Report Date:
Lesson
The interim restructuring of the program, at the request of the government, lowered the total program cost to the government. It also put greater emphasis on the program’s design features than on embedding the program deeper within public institutions. This may have been fiscally expedient but will have long-term costs that are hard to measure now. The government may have employed the program’s national consultants after it decided to fund SP2 and SP3, but ADB is unlikely to receive information on the results.

Project Number: 40003-013
Project Name: Poverty Reduction and Millennium Development Goals Acceleration Program
Report Date:
Lesson
Better coordination with Australian Aid was an explicit part of the PRMAP from the beginning. Adjustments to ADB’s country strategy and the design of follow-on programs may be better informed if there is sharing of information during and after each intervention.

Project Number: 40003-013
Project Name: Poverty Reduction and Millennium Development Goals Acceleration Program
Report Date:
Lesson
Policy reforms, coupled with institutional measures to address system inefficiencies and capacity constraints, enhance the effectiveness of human development interventions.

Project Number: 40003-013
Project Name: Poverty Reduction and Millenium Development Goals Acceleration Program
Report Date:
Lesson
Accurate baseline data and consistently measurable indicators enable a reliable assessment of end−of−project accomplishments.

Project Number: 40003-013
Project Name: Poverty Reduction and Millenium Development Goals Acceleration Program
Report Date:
Lesson
Targets and indicators in the DMF of program loans such as this need to be extremely conscious of exogenous factors. There is also a need for ADB program to assign focus areas for policy coordination and monitoring among ADB and other development partners so that respective contributions to policy dialogue under the different program components can be traced.

Project Number: 43191-023, 43191-013
Project Name: Economic Recovery Support Program— Subprograms 1 and 2
Report Date:
Lesson
All Pacific developing member countries, including Samoa, experience great difficulty implementing long-term structural adjustment policies. While demand-side, short-term price stabilization policies may be more readily implemented, longer-term changes to land tenure and state-owned enterprises and efforts to liberalize trade and investment regimes confront a very difficult political economy environment in the Pacific islands. Governments are comfortable with short-term price reforms that pose less of a challenge to the political economy.

Project Number: 43191-013, 43191-023
Project Name: Economic Recovery Support Program - Subprograms 1 and 2
Report Date: