Manila, Sep 21, 2006 AEST (ABN Newswire) - Asian Development Bank's (ASX: ATB) planned projects for Mongolia over the next three years have been adjusted to take into account recent developments in the country.
The Country Strategy and Program for 2006-2009, released last year, aims to help the country maintain stable broad-based growth and reduce disparities in development between urban and rural areas, while improving access to jobs, incomes, and higher quality public services.
According to a new update of the strategy, these overall directions continue to be relevant. But changes are needed to support the strategic approach being adopted by the Government to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), increase the effectiveness of development activities, boost governance, improve alignment with ADB"s priorities, and coordinate better with potentially larger inflows of funds from other donors.
"The overall directions have been maintained, but project designs have been reoriented to give attention to these five major considerations," says Adrian Ruthenberg, Country Director at ADB's Mongolia Resident Mission. "The Government"s strategic approach to achieving the MDGs make it crucial for ADB to orient its operations toward agreed upon priorities in specific sectors."
Proposed assistance from ADB's concessional Asian Development Fund under the updated strategy amounts to $48.3 million over the next two years, with assistance for 2009 still tentative.
ADB will pay careful attention to the increased demand from civil society for transparency and good governance. To align them better with ADB's priorities, projects will focus on catalyzing investments and managing the environment.
With regard to development effectiveness, projects will utilize Managing for Development Results, a management approach employed by ADB to improve planning, monitoring and evaluation, feedback, and learning.
Projects will also explore ways of harmonizing ADB lending with the priorities of other sources of funds. This is particularly necessary in Mongolia as more alternate sources of funds are now available than when the strategy was prepared last year.
As a result of these changes, support for the Government's agriculture strategy has been intensified with the Agriculture and Rural Development Project in 2007. In support of ADB's priority on catalyzing investments, the project has been reoriented to focus on the role of private investment and rural infrastructure.
Regional cooperation and integration also receives renewed attention in the updated strategy, and, to increase investments that are particularly beneficial to the poor, ADB will maximize efforts to mobilize resources from the Japan Fund for Poverty Reduction, from the Government of Japan, to complement the program.
Contact
Graham Dwyer
Email: gdwyer@adb.org
Tel:+632 632 5253; +632 898 3413; Mobile: +63 920 938-6487
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