Poverty and Human Development Report 2009 - UNDP in Tanzania

Chapter 3
limit the effectiveness of policies aimed at stimulating production, such as market liberalisation.
Infrastructure investments have higher social than individual returns, particularly in the context
of poor remote areas. Infrastructure development inherently requires long-term commitment and
major capital investments, therefore, these ‘public good’ investments are most commonly made
by the state, although innovative public-private partnerships can also be organised.
Infrastructure investments reduce risks and raise returns within the economy, especially within the
private sector, including for household producers. However, the challenge for large and sparsely
populated sub-Saharan economies is to focus these investments in areas that can produce
the greatest linkages within the economy and underpin the highest development returns. The
temptation to spread investments thinly across the country in response to political demands
should be resisted.
Human Resource Development
Successful implementation of a focused development agenda requires a supply of skilled
human resources that meet the demands of the market. Without a well-functioning skilled labour
force, productivity will remain low. The building of human resource capacity underpins the
transformational process in any society.
During the last three to four decades, public investment has been focused on basic education
and healthcare in many developing economies, partly as a consequence of resource constraints.
This is consistent with securing fundamental human rights to education, nutrition and health,
embodied in the Millennium Development Goals.
However, it is important that there is a strong linkage between the provision of basic education
and the development of capabilities for growth and transformation. This linkage can only be
achieved where states set high standards for quality in education. It is clear that the push for
broad-based primary education has to be accompanied by an equally strong push for quality
in order to link basic education with the strategic development of a skilled labour force. Access
and quality must go hand-in-hand to achieve desired development outcomes. Tanzania has
achieved good results in promoting enrolment, but the challenge of raising the standard of quality
in education remains.
Given limited national resources, strategic decisions have to be made to phase and sequence the
development of the human resource in line with the requirements of the medium-term strategy.
As countries strive to provide universal primary education, it is crucial to raise the quality of
primary, secondary and technical education, to appropriately equip students for subsequent
employment and, for those who continue academically, for tertiary education. In Tanzania, the
ongoing discussion about focusing government-sponsored student loans towards strategic
training at the tertiary level is a move in the right direction. This move is important because it will
provide the right signals to service providers of technical and higher education, both public and
private, on where to focus their training. It may also raise competition among training institutions
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