Appendix: Government Response
1. We firmly believe that DFID's role should be
one of encouraging developing country governments to prioritise
poverty reduction, rather than one of filling in the poverty gaps
left by governments which have an insufficient focus on poverty.
(Paragraph 16)
Agree. In Kenya, DFID's primary aim will be to support
the further development and implementation of the Kenyan Government's
own Economic Recovery Strategy for Wealth and Employment Creation
(ERS), including strengthening its poverty focus.
2. If the UK as a donor country wants to persuade
developing country governments to prioritise poverty reduction
and the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), it should outline
its plans in terms of assistance towards meeting these goals.
The UK Government must not allow the MDGs to slip off the international
development agenda - globally, or at a country-level - by neglect.
(Paragraph 21)
Agree. The MDGs remain at the heart of the Government's
international development policy. DFID's Public Service Agreement
is structured around the MDGs to maintain that focus. We are
actively seeking to keep them high on the international agenda,
and will seize the opportunities afforded by the UK chairmanship
of the G8 and the EU in 2005 to do this. The Commission for Africa
will also help keep the MDGs - and Africa, where they are proving
the most difficult to meet - at the centre of the international
development agenda.
3. A Country Assistance Plan (CAP) should not
simply outline DFID's plans; rather, it should provide a rationale
for its plans and an explanation of how its priorities are decided.
If priorities are decided on the basis of comparative advantage,
then more information should be provided in the CAP about what
other donors are doing in-country. In addition, given the need
for different donors to work together effectively, and to avoid
placing excessive demands on recipient governments, it would be
useful if CAPs included more information about the extent of,
and mechanisms for, donor coordination and harmonisation. (Paragraph
26)
Agree. We have strengthened the section of the Kenya
CAP on comparative advantage (paragraphs E1 and E2) accordingly.
We have also included an annex on the activities of development
partners in Kenya (an annex on this will also be a standard feature
in future CAPs), and have made increased development partner harmonisation
and alignment a key objective of the programme.
4. We welcome the fact that DFID's CAP set out
how it intends to support Kenya's development strategy, rather
than superimposing DFID's own strategy. DFID ought not to micro-manage
Kenya's development effort. But DFID must be able to assess whether
sufficiently speedy progress is being made towards agreed objectives.
DFID must be able to monitor Kenya's progress towards the MDGs,
and to evaluate the effectiveness of its assistance. The Secretary
of State accepted that DFID "ought to do more on how we track
and monitor". Well-designed processes for poverty reduction
and development assistance are crucial, but they must be judged
by whether or not they deliver the outcomes required in an agreed
timescale. We look forward to hearing from DFID as to how it
intends to do more on tracking and monitoring Kenya's progress
towards the MDGs. (Paragraph 30)
Rather than tracking Kenya's progress towards the
MDGs on our own, we are working with the Government of Kenya and
other partners to ensure that the information on progress is available
to all. We are supporting the Government of Kenya's efforts to
develop its own systems to monitor progress towards the MDGs.
Together with several other partners, we are developing a new
programme of support to monitoring and evaluation, including capacity
building in the Kenyan Central Bureau of Statistics. The DFID
contribution is likely to be around £3 million over 3 years.
In addition we are working with several line ministries to ensure
that they are able to capture and interpret the information they,
and we, need to track progress in the areas for which they are
responsible.
5. We recommend that the Africa Commission considers
the value of, and mechanisms for, joint monitoring and evaluation
by both donors and recipients. By making mutual accountability
and learning a central part of aid relationships, the aid effort
could be put on an upward spiral of increasing effectiveness,
and the delicate balance between local ownership and external
accountability might be more easily achieved. (Paragraph 33)
The Commission for Africa has been established to
galvanise action for a strong and prosperous Africa. The Commission
will analyse the barriers to Africa's development and make recommendations
for action to overcome those barriers.
At its first meeting on 4 May, the Commission agreed
to take forward six broad themes: economy, natural resources,
investment in people, governance, peace and security, culture
and participation. The relations between donors and recipients
will be considered within the economy theme - it is widely accepted
that the partnership approach is the best basis on which to support
effective development, and the challenge for the Commission for
Africa will be to recommend practical ways in which the partnership
approach can be put into practice more widely. Joint monitoring
and evaluation by donors and recipients is one option that will
be considered. The Government welcomes the support given by the
members of the IDC for the work of the Commission and encourages
them to contribute further both on the breadth of the Commission's
agenda, and on the role of Parliamentarians in Africa's development,
on which the IDC is working with the Secretariat.
Department for International Development
18 June 2004
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