Tracking resource and policy impact

The objective of the "Tracking Resource and Policy Impact" project is "Meeting the Data Challenge" from PARIS21 (2004) of providing a system for basic and general data for policy discussions and decisions for social sectors and other poverty issues, i.e. in education, health, water and sanitation, smallholder agriculture, and urban informal sector. The approach presented follows policy decisions and resources allocated across and within each sector, whether the resources are followed by an increased standard of services (and whether these services reach a greater share of the population), whether an increased standard and use are followed by higher achievements within each sector and finally whether higher achievements across the sectors are followed by reduced poverty. The Tracking Resource and Policy Impact incorporates the Millennium Development Goals and Indicators as well as Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper monitoring in the three social sectors, education, health, and water and sanitation, and aims to include even two income-generating sectors, smallholder agriculture and urban informal sector. The monitoring approach is designed for monitoring starting at the national level, and could be extended either upwards for international comparisons such as for the Norwegian partner-countries or downwards for local comparisons such as at district level. Measures and indicators are presented for each sector for all of the seven Norwegian partner countries in tables and graphs designed to fit different user needs. First, statistics for each step in the monitoring process are presented by sector. Second, statistics for impulse and effects are also presented by sector across two and two monitoring steps i.e. looking into the relationships between the different steps. The work has been initialised and funded by the Norwegian Development Agency, NORAD. An initial report was presented in 2002 (Wold, Olsen and Opdahl, 2002) and has served as the base for cooperation with our colleagues in National Statistical Office in Malawi and Uganda Bureau of Statistics in Uganda. The work is documented in this general report and two country specific reports to follow. The report shows that it is possible to establish and maintain statistical information to track resource and policy impact towards poverty reduction, other MDGs and PRSP objectives at the international level for the seven Norwegian main development partner countries. In general resources allocated to primary and overall health services and primary and overall school services are increasing since 1990. Increased resources go in general hand in hand with improved outputs and outcomes. But there are quite some cases where changes in inputs or outputs are not matched by changes in outcomes. Poverty data are still too short and irregular to give any trends. Some international databases tend to apply a policy of annually reviewing and adjusting national figures and if deemed necessary even adjusting single time series backwards - useful for some purposes, confusing for others. Further insight into tracking resource and policy impact requires country level data. Three main recommendations are presented: Recommendation 1 - Consider establishing a database for tracking resource and policy impact at the national level. Recommendation 2 - Consider establishing a permanent database for Norwegian users with data for the Norwegian development partner countries with annual electronic reports. Recommendation 3 - Before establishing a database for Norwegian users, consider whether to combine this with support to national level databases and a mirror database in Norway.

Acknowledgement : This project and report was initiated and financed by NORAD. We are grateful to our partners in NORAD and the series of international agencies who shared their ideas and experience with the team: DFID, UN ECOSOC, IDB, IMF, OECD/DAC, UN Population Division, UN Statistical Division, UNESCO, UNICEF, UNDP/HDR, UNFPA, WHO, and World Bank. Jan Erik Kristiansen, Lars Rogstad and Marit Vågdal in Statistics Norway advised us on presentation of data by graphs and maps. We have as far as possible incorporated approaches and advices but only the project team is responsible for the final approach, priorities and shortcomings.