ARGENTINA - Unido

participation of local counterpart institutions in the implementation of the
programme.
Main Lessons Learned
a) Supply driven programming leads to poor relevance at target group level and
hampers effective implementation.
b) The programme is a good example for an initiative that did not pay much
attention to the actual demand at the target group level. The existence of an
economic crisis and the availability of funds for a cooperation programme are
important pre-conditions for a programme but are by no means sufficient to
achieve the intended results.
c) Centralized decision making with little participation of local stakeholders causes
disruptions when the framework conditions of the programme change. Centralized
decision-making might be a good way of implementing projects quickly, i.e. to
carry out activities and produce intended short-term results (outputs). However,
to achieve outcomes, impact and sustainability a more participatory mode of
intervention is mandatory. For a complex socio-economic programme that requires
the participation of local stakeholders it is essential to establish participatory and
efficient decision making mechanisms at the local level.
d) When a complex programme with multiple lines of activities (investment
promotion, agro-industry upgrading, export consortia, ...) is managed as if it was a
specialized project, i.e. managed and backstopped by one UNIDO project manager
without involvement of other technical branches, UNIDO does not use its full
potential and adds less value. In such cases UNIDO might tend to act like a
financing- rather than a specialised agency, simply disbursing funds for uses
(equipment, consultants) that are not related to a process of UNIDO value
addition like, for example, demonstrating a UNIDO methodology for SME
development.
e) Programmes that intend to alleviate or overcome economic crisis need to be
sufficiently flexible and apply adaptive management in order to correspond to
changing conditions. Such flexibility does not mean that activities, outputs and
outcomes cannot be planned in detail from the beginning. It means that an
effective mechanism must be in place for reviewing regularly the progress towards
agreed goals and change the intended results and activities if needed. Such
adaptive management requires also the use of management tools, one of which is
a well-written programme document that applies the principles of the logical
framework.
f) In programmes that intend to alleviate or overcome economic crises it is very
unlikely that investment promotion activities will produce results.
g) For programmes in upper-middle income countries that have a clear orientation
towards less developed areas, a simple statement in the project document that less
developed areas will be addressed on a priority basis is not enough. To withstand
the frequent tendency towards the capital and more developed areas, the areas
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