Nigeria Edo State Fiscal Improvement and Service Delivery Operation

closed

This Edo State Fiscal Improvement and Service Delivery Development Policy Operation Program is the first in a new series of two programmatic development policy operations that supports Edo state’s medium term strategic plan focused on inclusive growth, employment creation and poverty reduction. Edo is one of 36 states in Nigeria’s federal structure. Like the average Nigerian state, Edo has a population of approximately 4 million people. It is situated in the south-south geo-political zone of the country and is one of the nine oil-producing states, albeit a marginal one. Since 2008, the current administration in Edo has vigorously pursued an infrastructure-oriented growth and employment agenda. The World Bank has supported Edo with a number of different operations during this period5. From 2012, the collaboration deepened with budget support in the form of a programmatic series of three development policy operations, each for the sum of US$75 million. The Bank began to provide Edo with development policy support due to the progress Edo had made on its own in implementing its development strategy and its commitment to undertake policy and institutional reforms to support its development agenda. The first operation, which was approved in March 2012 and closed in June 2014, supported Edo’s earlier development strategy articulated in the 2009 Edo Vision 2020, which identified high poverty, unemployment, flooding and dilapidated infrastructure as main development challenges. Edo also suffered from weak governance structures, particularly in the management of public finances. The state made appreciable reform gains under that operation in the areas of building a stronger public financial management system, improving institutional arrangements for land registration and strengthening the delivery of technical and vocational education; and it remains committed to an agenda of progressive reforms in these and other areas. There was however a long interval between approval of the first operation and preparation of this one due to a delay in obtaining federal parliamentary approval for the 2011-12 national external borrowing plan. Thus, the original series of three has lapsed and this operation begins a new series of two operations. This operation supports Edo state in the implementation of critical policy and institutional reforms to improve the management of its public resources; increase private sector access to land for investment and improve the quality of education.