Reports - United Nations Development Programme

COUNTRY EVALUATION: ASSESSMENT OF DEVELOPMENT RESULTS – TURKEY
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natural resources to land use, use of fertilizers, fodder crop
cultivation, tritycale planting and the vaccination of animal
stock. In a few villages, courses on family planning,
hygiene and home economics were oriented mainly towards
women, although a few men also attended (Box 4.2).
The LEAP project has been instrumental in both
introducing the concept of sustainable participatory
development in the region, as well as building up the
capacity of SÜRKAL, which is one of the very few
development NGOs in Turkey. LEAP serves about 3000
villagers. The direct economic impact of the project on
the region is difficult to assess because the project is
relatively new and such programmes take time to be fully
adopted by the villages. It is possible that the villages will
perpetuate the project committees and District
Development Committees set up, since this will facilitate
their continued participation and resource mobilisation.
However, sustainability and scaling-up of the project will
only be assured if and when a national agency or a
Regional Development Agency takes on the
responsibility for continuation of this sub-project.
Entrepreneurship Development Centre (GI˚MER)
As of January 2004, GI˚MER had been functional for one
year. It is based on the experience of GAP/GI˚DEM as a
model. It has served 126 SMEs in its first year, helping
them to choose technology, find markets (three
companies have found export markets), improve their
capacity and access credit. A few start-ups have occurred
with GI˚MER’s help, and it has organised a few training
programmes, including one for women aimed at creating
a Women Entrepreneurs Association.
The centre has established international links, two
with the neighbouring countries of Azerbaijan and
Georgia to improve the export capacity of local business,
and another with Purdue University/US to build their
internal capacity as a business development centre.
Atatürk University wants to continue managing the
programme and aims at employing some of the present
staff within the university for that purpose. They believe
they have a strategy to maintain GI˚MER as a sustainable
institution, but have had to give up the idea of replicating
the project in Kars as originally intended.
Rural Tourism Development Project
This project is at the inception and planning level rather
than in full implementation. So far, the project
coordination centre has tried to establish local ownership
and develop an action plan with the help of national and
international experts. As the idea is very new in the
region, the centre organised study visits to other Turkish
tourism sites, such as Nevşehir in Capadocia and
Olympus in Antalya.
The coordination centre hopes to mobilise EU
regional development funds and funds from the Social
Risk Mitigation Project of the WB for this component of
the LEAP. Only then can it have a real chance of
sustainability.
Assessment and Future Prospects for LEAP
The three project components of LEAP have been
prepared with significant inputs and care. In each of the
projects, baseline studies were conducted, international as
well as national experts were consulted and action plans
were discussed with the stakeholders. The procedures for
monitoring and evaluation of the outcomes, however,
have not been established.
The LEAP project works with smaller funds and
resources than GAP/GI˚DEM projects, which enables the
project to be more sustainable. As the costs are limited,
they can be more easily covered by income generated
within the province, for example, by the adoption of the
Business Development Centre by the University.
However, the lower costs are due to limited expenditures,
which means that the services provided are likely to be
more limited.
(ii) Poverty Reduction Initiatives
CURRENT INITIATIVES
Initiatives directly targeting poverty issues are relatively
more recent in the UNDP Country Programme.
However, in line with SRF (2002) goals there has been an
increasing focus on policy formulation and advice for
poverty reduction, and the future pipeline projects also
tend to concentrate on this theme.
The most important contribution of the UNDP to
poverty alleviation has been the publication of NHDRs
since 1990, the last one being for 2001. The NHDR has
highlighted the problems of poverty and social capital in
Turkey in a comparative framework, with comparisons to
other countries as well as with regional comparisons
within Turkey. In recent years, the HDI has been applied
to 86 provinces in Turkey, indicating the differences in
geographic disparities. The NHDR has been the entry
point for many policies on poverty.
The NHDRs have been very effective in creating
awareness on poverty issues, as well as on gender
discrimination, infant mortality, problems with health
services and education. The comparative framework