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OECD 1999
Country Assistance Evaluation: Case Study of the OED Philippines
– Search for implementation strengths and weaknesses.
– Identify important omissions at all three stages (diagnosis, formulation of
objectives, implementation steps).
– Draw country-specific and general lessons.
The focus of the CAR was on the issues which were still relevant at the time of
the evaluation for decision-making by the Government and by the Bank. In fact,
once the East Asian crisis erupted in July 1997 following our June field visit, we felt
compelled to deepen our evaluation of Bank assistance to the financial sector and
to cover issues related to crisis prevention and resolution. The starting point of the
evaluation was 1986, because it was a turning point in both the political landscape
and in the economic and social policy stance of the Philippines. We attempted to
evaluate the challenges, needs and assistance outcomes in all important sectors, so
as to provide a solid basis for a summary judgement on the Bank performance and
pass a balanced judgement on relative assistance priorities for the past and for the
future. This is not, however, a fixed or required feature of our country evaluations.
Most of our recent CANs (and some of our CARs), faced with tighter budgetary ceilings,
had to choose to be more selective in their coverage to assure adequate
depth of analysis.
CAR team composition
A fairly large team was assembled under the co-ordination of a task manager (a
senior economist and OED evaluator) who was also responsible for macro and private
sector development. The author of this note, another senior economist and
OED evaluator, was charged with assessing Bank assistance for public sector management,
but was later given the full responsibilities of the task manager after his
redeployment immediately following the June mission. A senior social scientist on
secondment from an evaluation unit of the Norwegian Government provided a contribution
on poverty; another senior economist on secondment from the evaluation
department of the Asian Development Bank covered agriculture and natural
resource management; a junior Bank consultant on social development explored
issues related to aid co-ordination, NGO participation, and gender equality; and
another Bank consultant provided a contribution on portfolio management, and
general research and statistical assistance. Desk contributions were commissioned
from consultants with varying degrees of Bank experience in the areas of financial
sector, quality at entry of the portfolio, water supply and sanitation, transport,
energy, health and education, environment and decentralisation. International
Finance Co-operation (IFC) and Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency (MIGA)
provided two descriptive boxes on their assistance. Among the peer reviewers, in
addition to OED staff familiar with the Philippines, we enlisted the head of the main
economic policy research institute in the country.
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