First Poverty Reduction Support Credit

closed

The Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) is explicitly defined within the vision of the New Economic Partnership for African Development (NEPAD) and includes the following objectives: (i) good governance, including peace-building and conflict prevention; (ii) decentralization and economic development in rural areas; (iii) development of basic infrastructure; (iv) promotion of human capital and skills in support of private sector development; (v) capacity building through the use of new information technologies; (vi) promotion of regional integration and international cooperation; (vii) protecting environment and managing durable resources; and (viii) protection of vulnerable groups by improving their productive capacity and reducing gender disparities. Within these broad orientations, the PRSP has four pillars: (i) wealth creation through economic reform and private sector development; (ii) capacity building and development of basic social services; (iii) improving living condition of vulnerable groups; and (iv) implementation of the strategy and monitoring of its outcomes. As noted in the joint staff IMF/World Bank assessment (December 2002), the PRSP suffered from some shortcomings, which the authorities intended to address during the first years of strategy implementation. Among them, it was found that the Government's plans to implement the Poverty Reduction Strategy (PRS) were not spelled out in sufficient details, notably with regard to a fiscal decentralization strategy that would assure better public services. The poverty diagnostic did not benefit from a complete analysis of the new household survey data, and the impact of the specific measures on the well-being of the poor was not analyzed in detail.