Examination of Witnesses (Question Numbers
80-99)
MR GARETH
THOMAS MP, MR
MARK LOWCOCK
AND MR
JOHN DENNIS
23 FEBRUARY 2010
Q80 Chairman: We agreed, anyway,
that, whilst we would refer to the land issue, it was not going
to be central to our report because it is such a major issue,
but I think Mr Bayley has put his finger on some of the background
to it. You just mentioned about effective DFID programmes. Indeed,
DFID is doing a lot of the co-ordination on the ground and that
seems to be welcomed by a number of the NGOs and charities. Two
things were said to us: one was that if things improve a lot more
donors are likely to come in and it is important that co-ordination
is established in advance, otherwise it could get chaotic. That,
on the other hand, may be too optimistic in terms of what is likely
to happen. But you cannot give the funding directly to the government
in most cases. Does that make it much more difficult to co-ordinate?
Clearly other donors may not be very keen to hand it over to one
lead donor, so what mechanisms do you need to have in place, or
what could you do to ensure that the relationship between donors
and the government is more direct than it is now? What are the
criteria that would need to be met?
Mr Thomas: We are a long way away
from having confidence in the systems of the government of Zimbabwe,
so it is a long way off before we would want to be putting money
directly into the government of Zimbabwe's budget. Nevertheless,
there are a number of ministries which are developing plans which
are pro-poor, which are designed to help all communities across
Zimbabwe and behind which we feel we can align some of our support,
so there are discussions with government about their future plans
and we are trying, as you say, to work with other donors where
we have confidence in those plans or in the merits of those plans
to put our financial assistance to support the achievement of
those plans. In terms of the broader issue about donor co-ordination,
you are right that donors are co-ordinating in general fairly
well, particularly those which are traditional OECD Development
Assistance Committee donors. There could still be better co-ordination
with the World Bank and others within the UN system. In the longer
term, if we can draw some of the non-traditional donors into the
donor co-ordination process, players like China, like South Africa,
like Brazil, that would clearly be an aspiration that we would
want to have, not just in the Zimbabwe context but in a whole
series of other developing country contexts too. Also, the donor
co-ordination mechanisms are relatively informal at the moment.
As you say, if conditions continue to improve and other donors
were to come in, then we would need perhaps to formalise some
of the donor co-ordination structures that are there at the moment,
but, in general, relations between the main donors are very positive,
as you describe.
Q81 Chairman: You have increased
the programme in recent years in difficult situations. If you
were going to put more money in, are you satisfied that the mechanisms
you have in place would be effective, or would you need to find
different or better ways of delivering it?
Mr Thomas: We are comfortable
that the mechanisms we have available at the moment are strong
enough and robust enough to ensure that the money that we are
spending in Zimbabwe is going to where it should go. Clearly,
if you increase your aid programme into a country, you have to
think through what implications that has for the particular funding
instruments that you use. We work, as you know, with UN agencies
and NGOs but also with a number of private sector organisations
which manage particular programmes of aid for us. As I say, we
have a strong process for monitoring how our money operates. Thus
far, we are confident that we have managed to make a significant
difference with our money. If we were to increase funding substantially,
then clearly we would look at the mechanisms we had available
to us.
Chairman: If we are moving on to that,
I will bring in John Battle.
Q82 John Battle: In a sense, the
real issue is governance, from my experience of the visit we did,
in particular the field visits. I would like to express gratitude
to the staff at DFID who took us out of Harare to Bulawayo. I
went with some of our colleagues to Tsholotsho and I was very
encouraged and impressed by work on the ground, not least around
the Protracted Relief Programme (PRP). All these things have great
titles, but I found a programme there to reach to people who were
poor, the poorest of the poor, the people who were landless, to
try to get back their livelihoods, with a whole range of activities
from home care right the way through. I was very, very impressed
by that programme. I just want to ask you a couple of questions
about it. If that has gone in the right direction, can it be amplified
and done elsewhere? The programme has two phases, as I understand
it, and we have just entered Phase II. Phase I was going for a
few years. I am lost at the scale of it. As I stood in a field
in Tsholotsho with those older women, trying out new cultivation
techniques for getting more water into their plants so that their
fields of maize and cowpeas would look rather healthier than the
ones across the way, I asked whether there was just one field
or thousands of fields like that. In the DFID evidence it says
that the programme is reaching over two million poor and vulnerable
people, but the plan for Phase II is to reach two million people,
and sometimes we include the two million that we have not quite
yet reached. I want to know the extent of the programme. Is it
really being disseminated across the country? Do you have just
one field in Tsholotsho or do you have programmes elsewhere in
the country? Can it be scaled up? I know the programme is working
with other donors as well, but is the scaling up happening and
is it possible for it to happen? Can you find the land? Can the
people respond to it? Can it be a much more mobile programme than
just one or two little pivotal projects?
Mr Thomas: I will bring in Mr
Lowcock in just a minute, but, first, thank you for your comments
about DFID staff in Zimbabwe. If I may, I will put on record my
appreciation for the work they do. They have had to operate in
some extremely difficult circumstances in the past.
Q83 John Battle: Indeed.
Mr Thomas: As Members will recognise,
we have some of our most talented staff deployed in Zimbabwe,
given the importance of the work we are doing there. The Protracted
Relief Programme has expanded. It is not just that one field that
you were sent to, but let me bring Mr Lowcock in to amplify on
that.
Mr Lowcock: It is a long time
since I have been in Tsholotsho, so I am glad to hear that particular
report. The programme covers 300,000 households, which is about
two million people, which is probably 20% of the total population.
Q84 John Battle: At present?
Mr Lowcock: At present, yes.
Q85 John Battle: The target for Phase
II was to reach two million people.
Mr Lowcock: I think that is the
current coverage.
Q86 John Battle: So you are already
well ahead.
Mr Lowcock: I think that is the
case, Mr Battle, yes.
Q87 John Battle: Good. What about
the range of activities? Many of the NGOs praise the programme
for its innovation in reaching from home care, and quite personal
support, to innovative agricultural techniques, including community
participation. While we sometimes focus on, as I said, governance
at the government level, community engagement of the people is
the real innovative work that DFID and other NGOs are leading
internationally. Is that integration being extended? Is that development
of those kinds of participatory tools able to take place? I felt
the local officials were not resisting it at the local level,
which augured well for the future of Zimbabwe if it could be scaled
up from the bottom. Is that the view of the Department in the
work that is going on at field level, at floor level?
Mr Thomas: Absolutely. We would
want to continue to see that programme scaled up. There is a series
of developing countriesand I think of Afghanistanwhere
we have similar grassroots programmes. We are particularly fortunate
in Zimbabwe to have very many committed civil society organisations
which are playing, as you describe, a crucial role in helping
to identify who most needs the support that the PRP programme
can give in communities. As you say, the range of support we are
able to give is a particularly important feature of the programme,
from the very direct assistance, be it seeds and fertilizers or
home care, to some of the more technical assistance, to help NGOs
help the individual farmers understand what they have to do to
increase their yields. As you say, it is an innovative programme
and we have been encouraged by the international community's response
to that programme. As you know, Phase I was very much a programme
that DFID initiated. Phase II has had much broader donor support
and in that sense has become a proper multi-donor programme.
Q88 John Battle: What struck me as
well was that perhaps with the word "farmer" in English
we think of some strapping young man who is ultra-fit out there
in the fields, but there were women who were older than I am and
what impressed me immensely was they have not had the benefit
of my education but their knowledge of agriculture and agricultural
techniques was incredible. I was quite excited by this new conservation
agriculture method and I wonder whether your Department is able
to feed that into DFID and some of the climate change discussions
and see if those methods can be tested out elsewhere in Africa
and South East Asia so that the learning from innovation can be
passed on? I thought as well as the process of engagement with
the people there may be some good agricultural science in there
that could be very helpful as well.
Mr Thomas: Far be it from me to
suggest recommendations to the Committee but drawing that particular
point out would certainly help us continue to spread some of the
lessons from the Zimbabwe programme across our other country programmes.
As you quite rightly said, the lessons in terms of climate change,
in terms of the particular farming environment, if you like, in
which our programme operates does potentially give information
that would be useful in a whole series of other developing countriesSedexparticularly
in the climate change context. As you know, one of the priorities
that the Secretary of State set out in last year's White Paper
was for us to do more on climate change in developing countries.
Learning the lessons from successful programmes such as the PRP
where there is a climate element is exactly the type of thing
that we need to continue to spread across the Department.
Q89 John Battle: It was noticeable
that we were speaking directly with the women, the farmers themselves,
not through an intermediary, an agent, the NGO's leader or even
the DFID person. DFID is actually involved in the programming.
If I can put it to you this way: I understand DFID now uses managing
agents and some of the conversations suggest that using agents
can become bureaucratic and can tie up resources of the partner
NGOs having to fill in analyses and sometimes the direct link
with DFID is not quite there, as it were. Although we had the
experience of talking to someone in the field, when the process
is taking place on a daily programme basis is the use of managing
agents causing delays in the transaction between DFID and the
work on the ground? Is it sometimes holding up the provision of
DFID support?
Mr Thomas: We need to recognise
that there was a substantial difference between Phase 1 of the
PRP and Phase 2. Phase 2 is inevitably much more ambitious and
involves a series of other donors. In a sense, what you want from
your staff is that they make things happen on the ground in terms
of developing countries. Our staff initiated this programme and
as others come onboard the pressures on those staff and their
ability to do other things would inevitably have been much more
constricted if they had continued to run the programme direct,
so we took the decision to bring in a private sector operator
and there was an international tender, as I understand. Inevitably,
when you have that sort of change there are one or two bumps along
the process. What the head of the DFID office in Zimbabwe is making
sure happens is that there are regular, I believe quarterly, meetings
with the heads of civil society groups in Zimbabwe to make sure
that we continue to have good coordination with civil society.
That will clearly be of importance, not just in terms of the PRP
programme but also in terms of the other programmes that we have.
Q90 John Battle: I will pass to Andrew
in a second. It was expressed to us that there could be a distancing
built in. What would worry me is that what seems to be really
radicalto use a word, I think it is connected to the word
"roots"about DFID's work is that ability to reconnect
at the ground floor level and get the pro-poor development going
on there and then feed it back up through. If you build a layer
in that cuts them off again it could undermine some of the good
work that has been done. I think Andrew wanted to follow through
on this.
Mr Thomas: May I just pick that
point up and bring Mr Lowcock in in a second. I think if there
was not regular communication with civil society then, you are
right, that would be a concern. In order specifically to avoid
any suggestion that we are getting remote we wanted to set up
a proper process for communicating with key players in civil society,
and that is what we have now initiated.
Mr Lowcock: I would just like
to put on the record that we have three members of staff in the
Harare office who still work primarily on this programme and they
are spending less of their time on the routine administration
and more of it on the strategic dialogue and, indeed, at least
once a month going out to regions like Tsholotsho and seeing what
is happening. In terms of the objectives of making sure we stay
in touch with the goals and the delivery of those goals, the way
we have organised the work is an improvement on the past arrangement.
Q91 Andrew Stunell: If I could just
pick up where John finished. First of all I want to say that we
saw some excellent on the ground projects which will be the anecdotes
and illustrations of my presentation about the work the Department
does for a long time. They were very good projects.
Mr Thomas: But.
Q92 Andrew Stunell: The "but"
is that there are so many levels between the money going in from
the office in Harare to the wheelchair-bound lady with her four
chickens in the compound outside Bulawayo that we have paid for.
There is the managing agent, there is the Zimbabwe-wide NGO and
there is civic society. When we pour £100 in at the top in
Harare, how much goes out and buys chickens at the bottom, where
does the other money stop on the way and what is the value of
that other money on the way in terms of the investment in civic
society and so on?
Mr Thomas: I would have to get
you the exact breakdown in terms of the portion of what we put
into the PRP programme that is taken up, if you like, as administration
costs. We need to be careful and to recognise that those different
layers, as you have described them, also play a key function in
helping us to account for how the money is spent, making sure
that money goes to the most needy people in Zimbabwe but also
that we have proper accounting processes in place. I can see that
as the programme has got bigger certainly one or two people have
raised concerns, but I do think it is important that we have that
administration element in there so that we do have proper checks
and balances. We will very happily provide for the Committee,
Mr Stunell, a more detailed explanation of what portion of the
PRP programme goes as administrative costs if that would be helpful.
Mr Lowcock: May I make an additional
point? As well as the cost of delivering the programme we need
to think about what the returns and benefits of the programme
are. It costs about $70 per household to provide the assistance
we provide under the PRP and the value of the production that
is generated by that $70 is about $140, it is a very high rate
of return. The alternative to providing some of the inputs that
we have provided would be in many cases to provide food aid which
would cost us between $700 and $1,000. The opportunity saving
of this programme is very high and the rate of return on the programme
is also very high. The numbers I have given you reflect the administration
costs as well as the costs of the inputs. We honestly think that
in terms of value for money this is a very effective programme.
Q93 Chairman: I think it is a very
important question that Mr Stunell is asking. As you will know,
Minister, we are up against rather tight timetables. The constitutional
requirements tell us that we have to have this report done in
a very short space of time, so if you are able to give us that
breakdown we need it very soon. I think it would be very helpful.
Mr Thomas: Okay. We will see if
we can do that.
Q94 Andrew Stunell: I just want to
underline that point. To give us real confidence that Mr Lowcock's
presentation is resilient, it would be helpful to have an additional
report and note from you.
Mr Thomas: Okay. We will get that
to you even quicker than usual.[2]
Q95 Richard Burden: This is really
on the same subject. From what we saw, I think we do understand
why managing agents are used and the good pressures that lead
DFID to go down that road. It is also fair to say that in terms
of the projects we saw in Tsholotsho and the engagement with the
women by GRM[3]
there it appeared to be good. However, I think the uncertainty
that some of us still feel is whether we will get to a stage where
the tail starts to wag the dog. If the need to have those managing
agents is because of their expertise and they get such expertise
that they are used not just by DFID but other partners as well,
the danger is that they could then become intermediaries that
start determining what happens rather than intermediaries that
do what is required from the grassroots or reflecting policy.
I do not think we are saying that is what is happening but we
see there is a danger that could happen. The question really is,
is it right that could be a danger and, if so, how do you guard
against it?
Mr Thomas: Let me bring Mr Lowcock
in in a second. When we take a decision that we want to contract
out, if you like, the management of a particular programme there
are a whole series of well-established processes which we follow.
We are very happy to provide some further information to the Committee
if that is what you need to give you some confidence that the
tail will not wag the dog in this particular context. There is
good donor coordination in Zimbabwe and, as I say, we have some
very experienced staff operating in our office, so I do not believe,
if you like, the worst case scenario that you are posing would
happen. Let me bring Mr Lowcock in to give you some further detail.
Mr Lowcock: I think you are exactly
right, Mr Burden, that in principle the problem you have described
could be one we face. We have tried to describe how we are mitigating
it in this case. The Committee knows very well the staff of the
Department is quite stretched. If we had more staff available
to us in Zimbabwe my own view would be that are other things I
would rather they did next before more administration and more
detailed monitoring and engagement on the PRP. I am satisfied
with the approach that we have to the management of the PRP at
the moment.
Mr Thomas: Just one other point
to make. It is not just us as one donor who plays a role in this,
there are a series of other donors who also are funders of the
PRP. In a sense, it is a shared process for looking at the administrative
cost element and taking decisions about tenders, et cetera, which
in that sense I hope gives further confidence and further checks
into the system.
Q96 Andrew Stunell: I would like
to hear from Mr Lowcock that if he did have those extra staff
and it is not what Mr Burden was postulating, what would it be
that the extra staff would be dedicated to?
Mr Lowcock: One of the issues
that came up in discussions yesterday with the Finance Minister
in Harare was follow-up to a discussion he had in Washington last
week when the board of the IMF restored Zimbabwe's voting rights.
He had some discussions with the staff of the IMF about what it
would take for Zimbabwe to move towards fuller normalisation of
its relations with the international financial institutions, including
potentially debt relief. We have a very good economist, who I
am sure you met, in our office in Harare, who is one of a rather
small numberI think I could count them on my fingers, excluding
the thumb, of one handof international macroeconomists
in Harare at the moment. That is a big prize for Zimbabwe to normalise
its relations to that degree, an awful lot has to be done to secure
that prize, but that would certainly be an area where it would
be worth putting additional professional resources in. We will
find ways to do that. That is one example I would give in answer
to your question.
Q97 Mr Lancaster: We will move on
to health, if we may. The Committee visited two hospitals, the
Mpilo Hospital in Bulawayo and a hospital in Harare. We saw the
maternity unit and we saw programmes associated with HIV/AIDS
which Mr Evans will ask questions about in a moment. What we saw
was very good. One of the key points that was put across to us,
and perhaps we should not be surprised at this given the diaspora
and the migration, was that there is a real shortage of skilled
health workers, many of whom have gone abroad. For example, in
the hospital in Bulawayo they had only recruited approximately
50% of midwives, although there is a midwife shortage in the UK
so perhaps that is a bad example. What are we doing to try and
recruit and retain health specialist staff in Zimbabwe?
Mr Thomas: One of the things,
as I suspect the Committee will be aware of, that has, if you
like, continued to focus our attention on the health sector was
the cholera crisis in 2008-09 where the crisis was sparked by
a long-term lack of investment in water and sanitation, but also
the substantial deterioration in the health sector which was caused
by many health workers wanting to migrate or simply not coming
into work because they were not being paid. What we have done
is to ensure that there is an allowance paid directly into health
workers' bank accounts to provide that direct incentive for them
to turn up to work and to go about their business. We can provide
direct assistance in that way, but in the end there has got to
be further economic stabilisation and a further reduction in the
political instability that exists in Zimbabwe. We can make a difference
in terms of public services, but to get anything like the type
of public services that we would recognise here in the UK those
broader economic and political changes are going to have to happen.
As I say, we are making a difference in terms of the allowances
we fund directly into health workers' bank accounts which has
helped recruitment to pick up. We are also helping to fund the
supply of crucial drugs. If you look at the government of Zimbabwe's
budget, they simply cannot afford to pay all the salaries of health
workers that are required or all the needs for drugs, so it is
the donor community which has to plug that gap. It is not just
us, it is a number of other donors too that are playing a role.
Q98 Mr Lancaster: You say the government
cannot really afford to pay the wages, so given that we have strikes
at the moment in Zimbabwe, and I think they are currently paid
$200 a month and they are demanding $500, is that realistic? What
effect would that have? What can we do?
Mr Thomas: One of the things we
can do is not to get involved in what is a conversation that has
to take place between those workers themselves with their own
government. What we can do, as I have said, is to respond to the
requests that we have had from the government, the Inclusive Government,
to provide support to the health sector, and through the continuation
of these allowances that is what we are doing and by making further
money available to target, for example, maternal health and to
continue our different aid programmes.
Q99 Mr Lancaster: Workers' pay and
drugs to one side, I suppose the other key element to try to improve
the health structure in Zimbabwe will be infrastructure. I know
that we are investing in six hospitals in Zimbabwe at the moment.
Can you perhaps outline what the aims of that programme are and
whether or not you intend to increase it, or how you see it us
moving forward in that area?
Mr Thomas: Obviously we want to
move from, if you like, the crisis phase of the health support
to getting a longer term plan in place for the health sector,
one that can tackle all the different health challenges that the
people of Zimbabwe face. I would not want to underestimate to
you the scale of the challenge that there still is, we are still
in a situation where I think substantial humanitarian assistance
will have to be provided for Zimbabwe. The scope to dramatically
expand our health programme, whilst I think it is there, is perhaps
more limited than we would like. You are right, we have to continue
to invest in infrastructure but continue to make sure there are
health workers in place and that those health workers are being
paid and, crucially, that the basic drugs and other supplies that
they need to go about their business are in place. If you like,
the next ambition that we have is to try to reduce maternal and
child mortality where there has been a substantial deterioration
in Zimbabwe more recently. We have recently committed some £25
million over the next five years to help people continue to get
better access to family planning services, to antenatal care,
to obstetric services and newborn care services.[4]
If you like, that is the next iteration of our support to the
health sector.
2 Ev 94 Back
3
The managing agents for the PRP. Back
4
This programme has been running since 2006. DFID are preparing
to renew and extend the programme when it is scheduled to come
to an end in 2011. Back
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