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Lesson
The knowledge team (formerly Knowledge Advisory Services Center) from the former Sustainable Development and Climate Change Department administered the TA and supervised consultants until the TA was transferred to the Partner Funds Division. Managing consultants through external resources should be based on a clear understanding of ADB procedures and guidelines and should be adopted only if necessary.

Project Number: 52299-001
Project Name: Demonstrating Future Thinking and Foresight in Developing Member Countries
Report Date:
Lesson
Hands-on involvement of ADB Staff in the conduct of capacity building workshops and documentation allows for rapid learning and upscaling of new technologies being introduced and further developed. The future thinking and foresight activities were implemented by ADB Staff and individual consultants. ADB Staff were ands-on in the conduct of the workshop and the documentation. This facilitated rapid learning and scaling up of future thinking and foresight approaches under other TA projects.

Project Number: 52299-001
Project Name: Demonstrating Future Thinking and Foresight in Developing Member Countries
Report Date:
Lesson
Close communication and timely adjustments in implementation arrangements help minimize the impact of disruptions and ensure TA completion within the original or revised timeframes.

Project Number: 52070-001
Project Name: South Asia Subregional Economic Cooperation Regional Energy Cooperation
Report Date:
Lesson
Adjusting consultant management to unanticipated disruptions, e.g., restrictions posed by the COVID-19 pandemic, will make project delivery more robust and resilient to challenges that arise during project implementation. The flexibility in the recruitment of consultants ensured the efficiency of this TA.

Project Number: 52070-001
Project Name: South Asia Subregional Economic Cooperation Regional Energy Cooperation
Report Date:
Lesson
Effective collaboration and coordination, country missions, and sustained communications are crucial to successful project implementation. The TA achieved its objectives through effective collaboration and coordination between ADB and SASEC countries. Country missions provided opportunities for course corrections when ground truthing revealed some additional risks or incorrect assumptions. Hybrid (online and offline) mode of communication allowed the TA activities to be implemented but at reduced cost.

Project Number: 52070-001
Project Name: South Asia Subregional Economic Cooperation Regional Energy Cooperation
Report Date:
Lesson
The timing of scope changes need to be carefully planned, especially taking account of the possible implementation disruptions these can cause. Adjustments to the design and monitoring framework need to be made to reflect scope changes and other design modifications undertaken during implementation.

Project Number: 52070-001
Project Name: South Asia Subregional Economic Cooperation Regional Energy Cooperation
Report Date:
Lesson
Managing implementation during emergency situations requires a flexible and adaptive approach. Amod the COVID-19 pandemic, PMU and PIU systems were based on (i) adjusted work practices, (ii) limited staff movements and restrictions on international and national travel, (iii) changes in consultant resource use and approach, (iv) supplier delays and reduced contractor capacity, and (v) assessments of the impact on implementation timelines, and planning extensions, as required.

Project Number: 41403-013
Project Name: Urban Water Supply Project
Report Date:
Lesson
Participatory approaches and stakeholder consultationsresult in widely accepted programs with a high potential for success. The design of the stipend program in this initiative followed extensive consultations and technical workshops with technical and vocational education and training (TVET) institutions, as well as development partners active in TVET. As a result of this participatory and collaborative approach, the stipend rate and disbursement mechanisms were widely accepted.

Project Number: 42278-024
Project Name: Second Strengthening Technical and Vocational Education and Training Project
Report Date:
Lesson
The economic downturn triggered by COVID-19 pandemic presented an unmet opportunity for the project . Additional stipend funds could have enabled the enrollment of unemployed youth in TVET institutions. This would have transformed a period of low economic activity into a skills development opportunity. A recommended strategy is for the borrowing government to earmark funds in an escrow account, ensuring continued disbursement to beneficiaries after project closure by ADB.

Project Number: 42278-024
Project Name: Second Strengthening Technical and Vocational Education and Training Project
Report Date:
Lesson
Inadequate documentation, including irretrievability and non-updating of project documents, reduces the level of scrutiny possible during project completion review and subsequent evaluations. Discrepancies in project assessments and progress reports, which tend to obscure actual results, make it difficult to establish project performance across the results chain. Non-availability in English of important documents, such as tracer studies, impedes the depth and comprehensiveness of project completion reviews and other evaluations.

Project Number: 42278-024
Project Name: Second Strengthening Technical and Vocational Education and Training Project
Report Date:
Lesson
EAs and IAs commonly perceive the low-cost option as the preferred option. However, in the case of consultant selection and civil works contractor selection in thisproject, this perception was debunked by poor contractor performance and issues with payment.

Project Number: 47009-002
Project Name: Guangxi Baise Vocational Education Development Project
Report Date:
Lesson
Implementation arrangements are critical to the success of projects. Initial implementation progress under this project was mixed: while output 2 was progressing according to schedule, outputs 1 and 3 were not. At ADB's instance, the implementing agency (IA), the Baise University instituted reforms in the implementation arrangements, with the Vice President of the university replacing the project leading groups.

Project Number: 47009-002
Project Name: Guangxi Baise Vocational Education Development Project
Report Date:
Lesson
Efforts to train EAS and IAs in ADB procurement procedures will do little in developing institutional procurement capacity with the persistence of staff turnover in these agencies. In this project, frequent turnover of key staff members prevented the training from reaching all those responsible for developing requests for proposals, formulating evaluation criteria, and reviewing bids against the criteria. Consequently, procurement capacity remained low.

Project Number: 47009-002
Project Name: Guangxi Baise Vocational Education Development Project
Report Date:
Lesson
Continuous monitoring of training results and job placement is required to ensure the integrity of the training data provided. The online training management system (TMS) was set up to track large-scale training outputs from numerous training providers, which also became a basis of milestone payments. The Skills Development Coordination and Monitoring Unit (SDCMU) carried out several types of monitoring and verification activities. Rigorous monitoring and regular field checks were essential for the payment system based on milestone achievement, especially with respect to job placement.

Project Number: 42466-015
Project Name: Skills for Employment Investment Program - Tranche 1
Report Date:
Lesson
It is good practice for an executing agency to conduct its own midterm review. This allowed timely assessment of progress and identification of issues that might cause shortfalls.

Project Number: 47305-002, 47305-004
Project Name: Horticulture Value Chain Development Project
Report Date: