Strengthening District Level Accountability and Service Delivery in Afghanistan

1. District Governance and Accountability Programme Strengthening District Level Accountability and Service Delivery in Afghanistan Richard HoggGovernance AdviserSouth Asia Governance and Public SectorAfghanistan

2. Project Components • Component 1 - MoF Funds flow/service outputs mapping & public perception survey • Links funding, output and perception of services for the first time • PETS approach for Education case study • Component 2 - IDLG District accountability & sustainability assessment • Accountability in the absence of District Council elections (DDA?) • Component 3 – ALA (etc.) District level process mapping & optimisation • Adapting BPS models to improve performance in delivery (land registration focus)

3. Intended outcomes • Better informed dialogue on GIRoA district level service delivery and its role in improving perceptions of government • Better understanding of the impact of off- and on-budget funding on service delivery • Highlighting the importance of O&M in development funding (building on the August Tadbeer report) • Advancing the use of PETS to analyse Afghan PFM • Development of methodological tools to enable further GIRoA efforts in district level data collection • Improved understanding of accountability drivers in district level governance • Recommendations to improve GIRoA accountability to public despite lack of progress with District Council elections • Engagement with IDLG over recommendations of current Presidential Commission (IDLG/MRRD) examining DCs & DDAs • Fresh perspectives on efforts to promote community engagement fora (DDA/CDC) and civil-military district level development • Improved understanding of potential to use process simplification at the district level • Adaptation of standard BPS practices for district level impact (e.g. supporting IARCSC sub-national PAR and anti-corruption efforts) • Informing World Bank ARTF Justice Sector Reform next phase planning • Informing efforts to improve land-related GIRoA service delivery (USAID LARA following LTERA)

4. Pilot Districts

5. The data challenge • Collection • Central ‘research fatigue’ • Lack of district disaggregation in the Provinces • Lack of clarity in Districts (KII, FGD) • External actors: variety, lack of data, unwilling to share • Operational challenges • Analysis • Data across levels and actors is inconsistent • Internal inconsistency from single sources (e.g. MoF: AFMIS, Provincial Budgeting, DAD; uneven systems/application of codes) • Predominance of external budget (where data is weakest) • Observations • The picture is unclear: impossible to deliver full fund flow mapping • Pilot effort highlights challenges in understanding district governance challenges • Concentration on relatively strong data sets and comparison across districts nevertheless permits an interesting perspective on relevant issues • View from the Districts is imperfect, but valuable as a unique methodical view from GIRoA’s primary service delivery units

6. Fund Flows: Core Budget at Provincial Level Overall 1389 operating budget expenditure report shows higher budget allocation to Balkh province (caused by 30% additional line ministries offices than in Laghman & large defense budget), but a lower per capita allocation than Bamyan • The core development budget is skewed by the weight of large infrastructure work (roads) in both Bamyan (USD 50m) and Balkh (USD 96m) • Bamyan remains better positioned in per capita budget allocation • Laghman is significantly underfunded

7. Fund Flows: Core Budget Expenditure report at district level 1389 6 month report on O&M shows a very low level of expenditure indicative of 3 things: low budget allocation to O&M poor planning and poor execution of O&M reporting of expenditure still centralised at provincial level (expenditure in cash or in kind made at the provincial level, for the district) • 1389 salary report shows discrepancies in reporting systems between Balkh and the other 2 districts, as most of Balkh expenditure still get reported directly at provincial level • district level data not yet fully reliable but 1390 should give a full picture and better opportunity for per capita comparions • Education remains the predominant expenditure line in terms of salaries

8. Fund Flows: External BudgetDifficult compilation of data at provincial level Reports from the aid coordination unit on donors commitments highlight the challenge of reporting on multi-year commitments when funds are managed outside government systems Cumulative commitments on external budget confirm a stronger focus on Balkh in absolute, but a higher per capita commitment in Bamyan. The execution rate however is much lower in Bamyan, an indication of the difficult access and limited local capacities. Laghman remains at the bottom of all 3 provinces 1389 government projections of the external budget provides an incomplete picture of external funds allocated to provinces External funds make government accountability difficult because:  Donors don’t report regularly, more often once a year, all financial data compiled at programme level or national level  Donors don’t budget nor report with provincial breakdown • CERP funds focus predominantly in the South and East, as a tool to support stabilization activities. Laghman is finally receiving some attention (!). A total of USD 58m is committed to the Laghman, incl. USD 10m for Qargaye • CERP has allocated funds to the northern regions only recently.

9. The emerging picture (1): outputs [Balkh] Education • 28 elementary schools (2B, 6G, 20M) • 4 middle schools (boys) • 6 high school (5B, 1G) • 1 madrassa • 30,850 students (59%B, 41%G – G% lower prov average) • 574 teachers (460M, 114F) • About 25% of the schools do not have buildings Infrastructure / Energy • Balkh-Sheberghan road: asphalted Ring Road connecting Kabul to Herat via the north • Balkh-Dehdadi rd • Bandar Emam rd linking Balkh DC to Mazar + 6 villages • Chamtal rd: Balkh to Chamtal and 10 villages • Aqcha rd: Balkh to 9 villages to Jawzjan • Kelift rd: Balkh to Dawlatabad d + 30 villages All roads year round accessible • Electricity supply from Uzbekistan via Mazar • Low end consumption = limited incentive to extend the grid beyond Balkh DC / NSP instead Agriculture & Irrigation • Most arable land is irrigated (54,000 ha) • 8 irrigation canals from Balkh river, 100 villages out of 117 have deep wells, very deep water table in some areas = water resource management need continuous improvement • Diversified agriculture: cotton, sesame, tobacco, rice, wheat- large producer of vegetable/fruits • 21 cooperatives , most of them not very active Health/Sanitation 1 District Hospital (50 health staff) 1 CHC (2 doctors) /4 BHC (6 doctors)/1 SC (1 doctor) = ratio doctors/population one of the highest in the province Insufficient access to clean water considered as a significant issue

10. The emerging picture (2): perceptions • Local Governance: appreciation of the governor in all 3 districts seems relatively high. Mixed review of the justice system (perception survey not the right tool to assess justice issues?) • Health & Education: people generally believe that significant progresses have been made over the past 9 years in health and education, but mostly in terms of infrastructure. Perceptions are less positive when assessing the quality of the services (skills and competences of teachers and health staff, lack of text books), particularly in the field of health since the change of IP since 2010 in the BPHS programme • Economic Activities: Employment remains the #1 concern of Afghans / a certain dependency on what and how much the GIRoA should “provide”: in agriculture for example, farmers across the wealth line mention seeds, improved seeds, livestock, storage, marketing , etc… • Land issues difficult to assess because people are not comfortable disclosing the status of their land (fear of taxation). Others think that if they use the land they are the owner. Process for land registration is possibly influenced by political considerations (positioning of Amlak in DG office) • Alimited understanding of the role of NSP: described as a project implementing mechanism more than community consultation/empowerment process. Limited capacity amongst the population to relate to technical pertinence and strategic pertinence of NSP projects. Limited awareness (if any) of DDA • Corruption: although the survey is not looking directly at corruption, the term comes up frequently, as a quasi “proxy” for dissatisfaction. If a service does not exist, or is poorly delivered or implemented, people refer to “corruption” (rather than to technical skills available locally, or financial capacity of the region/country) • Security: most people consider that security is acceptable, even in Qarghaye, for themselves, but not for GIRoA or NGO employees Are you satisfied with the education services provided in your area?

11. Sectoral example: Education PETS Focus on Ministry of Education (MoE): • Represents over 15% of the national operating budget and 4% of the development budget; • Employs 67% of the country’s civil servants; • Pilot ministry for setting-up of the budget reform initiatives; BAMYAN BALKH LAGHMAN Population: 411,700 Number students: 108,870 Number schools: 305 (54% 1sh/46% 2sh) Number teachers: 3064 (80% male) Population: 1,194,000 Number students: 383,463 Number schools: 441 (37% 1sh/53%2sh/11%3sh) Number teachers: 9523 (51% male) Population: 410,300 Number students: 173,996 Number schools: 230 (86% 1 shift) Number teachers: 3348 (90% male) YAKAWLANG BALKH QARGHAYE Population: 82,300 Number students: 23,695 Number schools: 58 Number teachers: 501 (47/teacher) DED employees: 11 Population: 112,400 Number students: 34,176 Number schools: 40 Number teachers: 657 (52/teacher) DED employees: 15 Population: 92,200 Number students: 26,513 Number schools: 48 Number teachers: 571 (46/teacher) DED employees: 10 • Challenges: •  Inaccessibility of schools; • Long winter season during which schools closed; • Lack of city power in province (use of generators and fuel). • Challenges: • Security concerns; • Number of schools that run 2 or 3 shifts; • Insufficient staff at district level. • Challenges: • Large number of schools with no/insufficient building; • Insurgency/ security concerns; • Large gender disparities in teachers. Population data from CSO Statistical Yearbook 2009-10 (projections used), local estimates of district population is much higher; EMIS 1388 data used for number teachers, schools and students; EQUIP data provided by Kabul EQUIP-Office

12. Education PETS (2) • Salaries and wages: • ✔ Major improvements in terms of timeliness of payment of salaries to teachers (over 80% receive on time in past 3 months); • ✔ Processes are understood at all levels; forms are filed and accessible; • Late disbursement of funds identified as major reason for delay in recent months; • AFMIS system technical problems slows processing at Mustoufiat; Operations and Maintenance: All level officials are aware of the paucity of budget allocation for this component School level: ✔Knowledge about needs, Use of community resources to seek solutions to O&M problems; ✖ Lack of skills for planning and prioritizing needs; Lack of confidence in official processes. District level: ✖ Lack of sufficient and qualified staff to process requests from schools and those of the office; ✖Past experience of not accessing funds diminish trust in the process. Province level: ✖ Weak planning skills for pre-empting needs of offices; Lack of feedback regarding inputs that are provided to the MoE. ✖ Decisions involve various actors (Mustoufi, Governor) and thus depend upon relations between officials; • EQUIP school construction: • Completion is impeded by various types of bottlenecks that combine differently in provinces; • ✖ Procedural bottlenecks (inadequacy of disbursement of installments, lack of physical funds); • Exogenous bottlenecks (duration of construction season, accessibility for transport of material, security constraints); • Areas of focus for future; • ✔ Differentiated assessment of the cost of construction in each province; • ✔ Define role of the shuras and school management committees. • Textbook distribution: • ✔ Coherent process for planning and distribution of adequate number of textbooks; • ✔ Improvement in quality of the textbooks in 1389; • At provincial and district level lack of adequate staff for counting and storage of books; Insufficient transport budgets. • At school level lack of staff to estimate number of books required; No budget for transport from district to schools.

13. Accountability features [Balkh]

14. Accountability functions: initial observations • Traditional organizations in sub district levels have accountability relationships that appears to be robust but not properly documented • Non traditional organizations in sub district levels have accountability relationships that are still emerging but whose documentation is in place, most especially the CDCs • DDAs and CDCs have same project ID and implementation tasks, with CDC mechanisms appearing to have better documentation and process checks and balances • Very weak accountability relationships of all district level organizations • Recommendations of IDLG/MRRD Commission to consider lack of DC elections could change the status of DDAs radically • Context of other district level initiatives, such as ASOP, DDP, RAMP-UP, ASGP

15. Processes: focus on potential delivery improvements • Land disputes key driver of conflict: goal of improved delivery in land registration • Sub-national efficiency gains possible, in addition to central policy support and informing donors in the field • Methodology for improving any district level administrative service delivery process

16. Emerging headline issues • Capacity of District Level Administration • Short working hours; staffing issues • Operational concerns (O&M funding issues) • Limited assets • Poor information flows • Incoherent and variable delivery processes • Cost effectiveness • Lack of consistency in administrative/accountability functions • Wages and O&M costs relative to actual services delivered • Correlation of funds to outputs to perception • Competition and overlap in functions of District bodies • Strength of external budget undermines District administration • Sustainability • Cost of maintaining structure of 400+ districts • Transition context • Policy environment: delivering methodical data • Models for GIRoA systematic data gathering and analysis in future • Potential improvements • Undermining corruption arising due to process ‘coping’ • Better integration of District level administration into wider GIRoA systems • Rational approach to improving GIRoA administrative (not political) harmonisation and responsiveness to local needs at its lowest unit level • More intelligent basis for GIRoA sub-national public administration reform efforts • Justification for better donor information sharing and coordination; building in awareness of challenges at District level