Post 2015: Global Action for an Inclusive and Sustainable Future

levels of formal education. third, it has sometimes
been perceived that the donors become more
operationally involved under SWaps (nepal case
study – pandey et al., 2012).
For budget support, a major challenge is that
donors often have competing objectives and fail
to coordinate and establish common priorities.
their objectives in providing budget support range
from poverty reduction to promoting sectoral
and governance reforms. although evaluations
of budget support demonstrate its effectiveness,
there is a danger of ‘overloading’ it with competing
objectives (Faust et al., 2012b). this makes it hard
for governments to focus on any of the objectives,
which means that budget support falls short of
its potential. In such cases, the lack of coherence
among donors prevents recipient governments from
being able to plan and budget.
Results-based approaches
results-based approaches can be divided into resultsbased
aid and results-based financing. the former
involves government-to-government aid and the
latter contracts to service providers (pearson, 2011).
results-based aid usually includes negotiations
on several key steps (Klingebiel, 2012). First, the
intended result must be agreed since the provision
of oDa is conditional upon its achievement. Second,
an independent third party must be identified to
evaluate the results. It is difficult to assess the level
of rba to date because most projects are still at the
pilot stage, and it therefore represents only a minor
share of overall oDa.
In principle, linking aid more closely to
performance can be attractive both for donors
and for aid-recipient governments. It allows the
latter to allocate aid more efficiently, expanding
successful programmes and cutting back on
weaker ones (morris and pryke, 2011). It also
enables donors to produce evidence of the impact
of oDa because rbas verify that the intended
outcomes have been achieved. rbas are also an
opportunity for governments to obtain funding
without donors interfering in their domestic affairs
because the negotiations are about results and not
approaches. rba is thus likely to provide incentives
for governments to achieve results in their own
ways and resolve their own policy or bureaucratic
constraints. Governments may also become more
accountable to their domestic constituency because
rba may encourage them to improve the quality of
service provision (Klingebiel, 2012), which might
in turn increase ownership of their political and
administrative systems.
rbas could potentially contribute more to
development if certain issues were addressed. First,
the concept definition varies and the terminology
remains unclear. the European commission,
governments, bilateral aid agencies and others use
terms such as results-based aid, cash-on-delivery,
pay-for-performance and results-based financing,
sometimes to mean different things. In addition,
there is still a lack of empirical evidence since
various forms of ‘managing for results’ projects,
as set out in the paris Declaration, are still being
piloted or are in their infancy. For example, nepal
has embarked on a bridge-improved project with
the support of the World bank under program-forresults
(p4r) lending that started only in July 2012.
the success of rbas also depends on requirements
that can be difficult to fulfil. First,
producing a comprehensive and exact assessment
of the existing situation relies on having reliable
baseline data. Second, the contracting partners
have to agree on a precise formulation of expected
results, and on measurement and monitoring
methods. third, the assessment of results again
requires reliable information and data. Each of
these may result in costs.
there is also the risk that rbas could encourage
donors to favour short-term programmes with
outcomes that can be directly attributed to their
support. this would undermine donor coordination
poSt-2015: Global actIon For an IncluSIvE anD SuStaInablE FuturE
In principle,
linking aid
more closely to
performance can
be attractive both
for donors and
for aid-recipient
governments.
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