An Evaluation of the World Bank's Trust Fund Portfolio

CHAPTER 3THE RELEVANCE AND EFFECTIVENESS OF TRUST FUND SUPPORT FOR DEVELOPMENTThe distinctivefeatures ofsingle-recipientcountryandmultiplerecipientcountrytrustfunds, and ofsingle-donorand multidonorfunds, influencehow effectivelytrust fundsdeploy theirresources.questions it raises about an effective division of labor andcoherence within the overall aid system in health. 12Lack of predictable aid flows. Global funds—for instanceEFA/FTI and the Global Fund—were set up with the statedintention to provide more predictable aid flows to countryprograms. Yet, evaluations of both vertical funds indicateshortfalls in the predictability of year-by-year financing torecipients, which impedes planning for the use of their ownresources and those of other partners.Inefficiencies in relationships among donors. Asgovernments, donors, and Bank staff frequently said ininterviews, “trust fund coordination is time-consuming” and“too much of the time is spent on processes related to pooledfunding, crowding out time for supervision and programadjustment in response to problems of implementation.” Onesource of inefficiency is the frequent need to seekauthorization for actions by Bank country staff from Bankheadquarters and in-country donor representatives from theircapitals, adding time and complexity to trust fundnegotiations and design. Also, conflicts andmisunderstandings, most notably around procurement andthe use of country systems, have strained relations betweenthe World Bank and trust fund donors in some countries. Inboth Benin and Rwanda this tension led to a shift away fromthe World Bank in the management of specific trust funds(focused on public financial management). It is also oneunderlying reason for broad change in the supervision of theEFA/FTI trust fund, from a model where the Bank is theprimary supervisory agency to one where that role isdetermined at the country level, with agreement amonggovernments, donors, and the World Bank. Donor reforms toreduce earmarking, increase funding predictability, andaligning trust fund cycles with the Bank’s business cycle andthe streamlining of the Bank’s overall procurement regime(discussed in chapter 4) could help ease the inefficiencies.THE IMPACT OF KEY STRUCTURAL FEATURES3.52 Both donor and recipient features of trust funds impact howwell trust funds deploy their resources. That is, it matters to howeffectively and efficiently trust funds have performed whether theyhave been focused on single or multiple recipient countries and hadsingle or multiple donors, as illustrated in table 3.1.44