Tanzania - Education Planning and Rehabilitation

 ICRR 10174 Report Number : ICRR10174 ICR Review Operations Evaluation Department 1. Project Data : OEDID: OEDID : C2137 Project ID : P002790 Project Name : Education Planning and Rehabilitation Country : Tanzania Sector : Other Education L/C Number : C2713 Partners involved : NORAD, SIDA Prepared by : Charles Derek Poate, OEDST Reviewed by : Linda Ankrah Dove Group Manager : Roger H. Slade Date Posted : 08/19/1998 2. Project Objectives, Financing, Costs and Components : Objectives: (i) strengthening institutional capacity for planning and implementing appropriate and effective education policies and programs; (ii) improving the quality of primary and secondary education; (iii) strengthening the mobilization and use of nongovernmental resources and support for education . Components: (i) training of managers, improving the information base, strengthening education research for policy development and sector studies; (ii) strengthening the capacity of the Institute of Curriculum Development, improving science teaching methods, developing capacity to provide and use textbooks effectively, upgrading libraries; (iii) encouraging community involvement in schoo maintenance and operation. Costs and financing: Estimated costs were US$67.5 million. The Bank credit was US$38.3 million of which US$ 7.65 million was cancelled following the mid -term review. Co-financing was provided by NORAD (US$ 8 million) and SIDA (US$ 12 million). The project was approved on June 8, 1990 and closed on December 31,1997, following a 12-month extension, with cancellation of US$0.56 million. 3. Achievement of Relevant Objectives : (i) The strengthening of sector planning and management was achieved but the management training agency's curriculum and staffing remained limited . ii) Improvements in educational quality were mainly achieved. Activities in curriculum development and textbook review had a positive impact . Although Teacher Resource Centres were built, the integrated science curriculum was not implemented . Privatization of textbook production was done and production and distribution improved . (iii) Community resources were mobilized with more primary schools being rehabilitated than planned . However, pilot schools had a limited effect and the targets for the rehabilitation of non -government secondary schools were not met. 4. Significant Achievements : At the request of the government, the project design was modified to include two pilot components -- community contributions to develop primary schools and secondary school scholarships for girls from poor households. These were sufficiently successful to form the basis for a new pilot project . 5. Significant Shortcomings : (i) institutional capacity was too weak to handle some of the more innovative components and co-ordination across a variety of institutions was unworkable; (ii) sector policies were unclear and inconsistent; (iii) some subcomponents were not well conceived or fully discussed before being included in the project; (iv) inadequate financial management led to cost overruns. 6. Ratings : ICR OED Review Reason for Disagreement /Comments Outcome : Satisfactory Marginally Satisfactory ICR para. 39 concurs with the marginal rating. Institutional Dev .: Partial Modest Sustainability : Likely Likely Bank Performance : Satisfactory Satisfactory An otherwise good appraisal over-estimated project management and sectoral capacity for policy reforms and frequent changes of Task Manager impeded an otherwise sound supervision performance. Supervision improved from mid-term review. Overall performance was satisfactory, though marginally so. Borrower Perf .: Satisfactory Satisfactory Uneven performance but marginally satisfactory in a challenging context . Quality of ICR : Satisfactory 7. Lessons of Broad Applicability : (i) If a project is to be implemented by more than one ministry, normal government institutional arrangements for project implementation should be used and special project units outside the line functions of a ministry should be avoided. (ii) The traditional project approach may be inadequate to address certain sector issues when the policy framework is unclear and institutional capacity is weak . The use of the new Learning and Innovation Loan would allow the government to test innovations before implementing them on a large scale. 8. Audit Recommended? Yes No Why? In a country sector review as a project from which many lessons may be learned on institutional and policy reform. 9. Comments on Quality of ICR : The quality of the ICR is thoughtful, comprehensive and satisfactory overall . Major issues have been adequately addressed, including the inappropriateness of an investment credit to achieve policy reforms and the need for qualitative and institutional outcome indicators .