Step 4

Financial Environment

To gain an understanding of the financial environment within which school infrastructure is planned, designed, constructed, operated and maintained. 

Normal Condition

At the end of this step, the team should be able to do the following:
a) Identify historical and planned investment programs
b) Identify the decision-making process for resource allocation
c) Identify the financing mechanisms within the public investment system

Module Activity
4.1 Institutional budget for school infrastructure  4.1.1. Identify budget allocation for the sector, and specifically for school infrastructure
4.1.2. Analyze budget execution for school infrastructure
4.2 Current investments in new and existing infrastructure 4.2.1. Identify historical and current investment programs for new school infrastructure
4.2.2. Identify historical and current investment programs to repair or retrofit existing school infrastructure 
4.3 Financing investment system  4.3.1. Identify the funding mechanisms of current investments
4.3.2. Identify investment requirements and key decision-makers 

 

Local partners and technical expertise

The table below presents a list of suggested local partners and technical expertise required to contribute to or lead the activities of this step.

Key agencies

  • Ministry of Education and any other agency involved in school financing
  • Ministry of Finance

 Contributing agencies

  • Ministry of Planning and Development (if any)
  • IFIs, donors, and NGOs involved in the school financing

Technical Expertise

  • Ministry of Education: team (economists, engineers, managers) involved in school financing and with knowledge of the public investment system
  • Ministry of Education: Senior economist involved in school financing
  • Ministry of Finance: economist/specialist involved in budget allocation for school financing

 

Module 4.1. Institutional budget for school infrastructure

Activities under this module will allow task teams to learn about the government’s resource allocations for existing school infrastructure, as well as the capacity of involved agencies to implement them.

 

Activity 4.1.1. Identify budget allocation for the sector and, specifically, for school infrastructure

This activity focuses on the education sector’s budget allocation process and patterns of investment in school infrastructure. The goal is to have a clear understanding of the historical behavior and trends in school infrastructure budget allocation, which refers to funding for any type of intervention from central or local governments for new and/or existing infrastructure. Information obtained about the education sector’s budget, preferably spanning the previous five years or more, is to be sorted sequentially into the various funding sources and respective allocations to school infrastructure. The challenge will be to collect and integrate information from various sources that do not always clearly separate out school infrastructure expenditures. The results from this activity will be used in the projection of investment scenarios in step 6 and 7. 

Guidance:

The analysis of the budget allocation should take into account public funding, as well as any external sources that have been approved by the government and are predictable over time. In low-income countries, public spending tends to be low, and IFIs and development partners play a key role in financing investments in, for example, school infrastructure. Often, the government entities in charge do not receive regular allocations from the public budget and must rely on external sources of funding. For task teams doing this analysis, such external resources can be included as long as the funding covers a continuous period of time (that is, five years or more) and has been under the government’s oversight. 

Budget resources allocated for the maintenance of schools are limited and poorly defined. This lack of maintenance of school infrastructure is reflected in the limited information available on these activities. Funding for maintenance usually comes from central and local governments and even communities. It is important for task teams to collect all available information and to understand the budget resources allocated and the frequency and types of activities undertaken as part of maintenance.

Comparing the budget allocation and spending on education and school infrastructure across countries can be useful to inform the plan. The comparison of education and school infrastructure allocation in a given country with peer countries or the use of benchmarks from developed countries—such as Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) members—can provide key insights for the political economy of the plan. This comparative analysis can also be useful at the subnational level when, for example, comparing across cities or municipalities.

This analysis in a post-disaster context remains relevant even though the reconstruction budget allocation may be exceptional and determined by the extent of the impact. The resources allocated for the reconstruction of schools should be included in the analysis of the sector’s regular budget allocation. For the task team, it will be important to understand how and where these resources are distributed, in particular for the most affected areas. A surge of additional funds will also come from contributions by donors or international aid.

 

Activity 4.1.2. Analyze budget execution for school infrastructure

This activity is focused on understanding the sector’s capacity to spend on school infrastructure. The budget originally approved and allocated may vary from the actual resources spent as a result of factors ranging from administrative bottlenecks during implementation to emergency response activities after a disaster. Identifying these differences can provide opportunities to increase efficiency in the execution and allocation of resources. This activity builds on the information collected under activity 4.1.1 to track the annual average figures of the amount allocated, final amount executed, and remaining resources. 

Guidance:

The information on school infrastructure spending, which comes from different government levels, should be disaggregated accordingly. The analysis of overall spending capacity, in addition to other parameters identified under this step, will inform activities for the investment plan in step 7, while an understanding of the spending capacity by level of government will inform the implementation strategy (step 8). In developing countries, spending capacity tends to be lower at the subnational level, often due to limited human and technical resources. In decentralized contexts, local governments have strong participation in managing infrastructure investments; hence, identifying capacity-building needs and other areas for strengthening will ensure the plan’s implementation is not compromised as it moves forward.

This analysis should be led by relevant government officials. In particular, the ministries of finance and education should have both historical and current data on the budget, allocations, spending, and so on. Task teams should convene these key players and facilitate their participation to carry out this activity in line with the overall implementation of the RSRS and expected output(s).

To accelerate the pace of recovery from a disaster, spending capacity should be increased during the reconstruction process. To expedite the implementation of reconstruction work and related activities, the sector’s spending capacity can be increased by creating ad hoc implementation units or strengthening existing ones. Usually, these measures are temporary and will be discontinued as the reconstruction moves forward. For task teams, it will be essential to understand the sector’s approach to and capacity for managing these additional resources, as compared to normal conditions. The results of this analysis will inform activities in step 7. 

 

Module 4.2. Current investments in new and existing school infrastructure

Activities under this module will allow task teams to learn about the government’s resource allocations for new school infrastructure, particularly for vulnerability reduction interventions.

 

Activity 4.2.1. Identify historical and current investment programs for new school infrastructure

This activity aims to gain an understanding of past and current investments in new school infrastructure programs. The objective is to understand to what extent and how the sector has historically been financing the enhancement of school infrastructure capacity. This requires understanding the methods used to estimate the demand for new classrooms, the prioritization criteria (if any) used to allocate resources, the timeline of progress, and costs over time. Also important is information on the spatial distribution of these investments in urban and rural areas. 

Guidance:

This analysis should provide rich evidence of how the need for new infrastructure has been and is being addressed. It is possible, for example, to identify links between investments and demographic changes or even school building types built in different periods, thus helping the task teams understand the rationale behind the allocation of resources for new classrooms and anticipate the need for adjustments to meet future demand. 

New school infrastructure may be found to have design or construction flaws. In step 3, construction quality issues were analyzed. If quality issues are identified in the new infrastructure investments, task teams should collect information and discuss with the relevant agencies involved whether the issues relate to all of the investment program or just a portion. It is also important to understand what measures have been taken by the sector to overcome the issue in the future.  

In post-disaster conditions, this analysis provides insight about the existing capacity of construction services for school infrastructure. Existing school infrastructure programs can serve as a beneficial foundation for the reconstruction process, without which it would need to start from scratch. Task teams will need to gauge whether the expected investments for reconstruction are manageable for local construction firms or if complementary support is necessary.

 

Activity 4.2.2. Identify historical and current investment programs to repair or retrofit existing school infrastructure 

The aim of this activity is to gain an understanding of the past and current investments in existing school infrastructure programs. The objective is to learn how the sector historically has financed the interventions  (repair, rehabilitation, retrofits, or maintenance) in existing schools and the decision-making process that has been followed. It is to examine how these investment programs are defined and formulated, and whether they are articulated within a broader school infrastructure investment program and linked to any government priorities.

Guidance:

In the absence of national plans and/or school infrastructure programs, interventions and investments are addressed through a project portfolio approach, based on demands from local governments and school principals. The government entity in charge often receives requests from the subnational levels and even school principals, which are then consolidated in a school infrastructure project portfolio. As resources become available, these are distributed and allocated based on a set of criteria. With this approach, only a portion of the portfolio is commonly financed due to limited public resources. The inability to fund some projects implies some schools will not be served, and this can lead to problems with the principals of these schools and the communities in which they are located.

Investments in informal intervention projects should be excluded from the analysis. In general, these interventions are made with resources from communities and nongovernmental organizations and range from minor maintenance work to the construction of new floors or classrooms or new buildings in an existing school facility. They should not be combined with formal investments because they are not part of the public investment system, do not comply with the regulatory framework, cannot be considered permanent, and reflect an existing investment gap.    

Awareness of existing programs will facilitate their integration into the reconstruction plan. The reconstruction plan addresses not only the need for repair or replacement of affected school buildings, but also preexisting intervention needs. Indeed, in countries with good school infrastructure plans, reconstruction becomes an updated version of the existing plan. Thus, the analysis of historical investments sheds light on opportunities to leverage recovery efforts from subsequent programs.

 

Module 4.3. Financing investment system

Through this module, task teams will become familiar with the public investment system in the country and the decision-making process for school infrastructure investments.

 

Activity 4.3.1. Identify the funding mechanisms of current investments

The aim of this activity is to gain an understanding of the existing funding mechanisms used to finance school infrastructure investments. The objective of the task teams is to review, analyze, and describe all sources of financing used for school infrastructure, such as the education sector’s annual budget, transfers from the central government, internal and external loans, and donor contributions. The task teams are to work with the sector and with the ministry of finance to gain access to this information, which usually can be found in the ministry’s budgeting system.

Guidance:

Task teams should get to know the regulations and operating rules for the different funding mechanisms. Operating rules are established within the country’s public investment system, covering expenditure eligibility, accessibility conditions, priorities, implementation time frame, and reporting, among other areas. Two expenditure categories are widely used: operating expense (OpEx) and capital expense (CapEx). The former relates to regular expenditures needed to keep infrastructure operative while the latter relates to one-time expenditure to improve or enhance the condition and capacity of the infrastructure. Dedicated funding mechanisms may exist for each of these categories. For the design of the plan’s financial strategy (step 7), investments will be grouped by expenditure categories.      

In large-scale disasters, central governments use dedicated funding mechanisms for reconstruction. Task teams should familiarize themselves with reconstruction funding mechanisms so the plan’s financial strategy can be designed accordingly. Funding mechanisms in the RSRS refer to formal financial options established and administered by the government. Other financial contributions (from donors or nongovernmental organizations, for example), which may be particularly abundant in the recovery phase, can only be considered in the analysis if they have been officially integrated into the government’s financial strategy for reconstruction.

 

Activity 4.3.2. Identify investment requirements and key decision makers

The purpose of this activity is to map the detailed processes for mobilizing resources for school infrastructure and the decision-making processes corresponding to each funding mechanism. These are to be broken down into factors like eligibility criteria, application process, technical documents, spending time frame, and key decision makers. 

One objective of this activity is to recognize how central and local funding mechanisms are connected and, by that means, discover areas in which the education sector and municipalities can collaborate with the central government to inform future budgets. The decision-making process describes the chain of decisions made from the approval of submitted investment projects to the actual allocation of implementation resources, most of which are made by the ministries of finance, education, or public works.

Guidance:

From the analysis in this activity, task teams should be able to facilitate and improve the way decisions are made. We have observed that inefficiencies in the public project cycle stem from the poor quality and flow of information at each stage and trouble with arrangements to make decisions. The plan can make important contributions to each. The diagnosis phase constitutes a solid foundation for the definition of investment projects in subsequent stages. The primary purpose is to make a transition in the investment project design from a case by case to an intervention-at-scale approach. The analysis phase will unveil bottlenecks, gaps, and weaknesses through the investment design process and opportunities for simplification in the decision-making process.

This analysis reveals inadequacies in capacity among involved players that may ultimately affect efficiency in implementation. Low technical capacity within the government’s project units has a cascade effect on the whole project cycle. The quality of the technical documents and implementation provisions is often disputable, especially at a subnational level. Task teams should define the qualifications required of team members throughout the process so capacity-building needs can be integrated into the plan. This is as important as the formulation of the plan in some low-income countries, in which cases we recommend training programs as part of its kickoff activities.       

Customarily, fast-track procedures are created to provide access to reconstruction funding. Task teams should become acquainted with the detailed procedures related to the mobilization of school infrastructure resources. The reconstruction plan must provide the framework and required information for the formulation of investment projects. A fast-track option helps expedite the mobilization of resources but can also complicate the timely definition of investments and their formalization. For this reason, additional technical contributions from universities or other technical organizations to the design and formulation of reconstruction investment projects is highly desirable in the wake of large-scale disasters.

 

Output

The completion of activities under each module will result in one or more output(s). 

Module Output(s)
4.1 Institutional budget for school infrastructure 
  • Database and report: Main findings on the historical budget for the sector (general, educational, and school infrastructure budgets) and budget execution of school infrastructure investments
4.2 Current investments in new and existing infrastructure
  • Database and report: Main findings on historical and current investment programs for new and existing school infrastructure
4.3 Financing investment system 
  • Report: Current structure of the relevant ministry’s budget for school infrastructure investments, and main characteristics of the funding mechanisms

Post-disaster Condition

At the end of this step, the team should be able to do the following:
a) Identify historical and planned investment programs in the affected area
b) Identify the decision-making process for resource allocation
c) Identify the financing mechanisms within the public investment system under which the reconstruction should take place and other sources of financing

Module Activity Output
4.1 Institutional budget for school infrastructure  4.1.1. Identify budget allocation for the sector, and specifically for school infrastructure 4.1.1. Identify budget allocation for the sector, and specifically for school infrastructure in affected area (before disaster)
4.1.2. Analyze budget execution for school infrastructure

4.1.2. Analyze budget execution for school infrastructure in the affected area (before disaster)

4.2 Current investments in new and existing infrastructure 4.2.1. Identify historical and current investment programs for new school infrastructure 4.2.1. Identify historical and current investment programs for new and existing school infrastructure in the affected area (before disaster)
4.2.2. Identify historical and current investment programs to repair or retrofit existing school infrastructure  4.2.2. Identify historical and current investment engagements for the reconstruction of school infrastructure in the affected area
4.3 Financing investment system  4.3.1. Identify the funding mechanisms of current investments 4.3.1. Identify the funding mechanisms of current investments and additional funding sources for reconstruction
4.3.2. Identify investment requirements and key decision-makers  4.3.2. Identify investment requirements and key decision-makers in the reconstruction process

 

Local partners and technical expertise

The table below presents a list of suggested local partners and technical expertise required to contribute to or lead the activities of this step.

Key agencies

  • Ministry of Education and any other agency involved in school financing
  • Ministry of Finance

 Contributing agencies

  • Ministry of Planning and Development (if any)
  • IFIs, donors, and NGOs involved in the school financing

Technical Expertise

  • Ministry of Education: team (economists, engineers, managers) involved in school financing and with knowledge of the public investment system
  • Ministry of Education: Senior economist involved in school financing
  • Ministry of Finance: economist/specialist involved in budget allocation for school financing

 

Local partners and technical expertise

The table below presents a list of suggested local partners and technical expertise required to contribute to or lead the activities of this step.

Key agencies

  • Ministry of Education and any other agency involved in school financing
  • Ministry of Finance

 Contributing agencies

  • Ministry of Planning and Development (if any)
  • IFIs, donors, and NGOs involved in the school financing

Technical Expertise

  • Ministry of Education: team (economists, engineers, managers) involved in school financing and with knowledge of the public investment system
  • Ministry of Education: Senior economist involved in school financing
  • Ministry of Finance: economist/specialist involved in budget allocation for school financing

 

Module 4.1. Institutional budget for school infrastructure

Activities under this module will allow task teams to learn about the government’s resource allocations for existing school infrastructure, as well as the capacity of involved agencies to implement them.

 

Activity 4.1.1. Identify budget allocation for the sector and, specifically, for school infrastructure

This activity focuses on the education sector’s budget allocation process and patterns of investment in school infrastructure. The goal is to have a clear understanding of the historical behavior and trends in school infrastructure budget allocation, which refers to funding for any type of intervention from central or local governments for new and/or existing infrastructure. Information obtained about the education sector’s budget, preferably spanning the previous five years or more, is to be sorted sequentially into the various funding sources and respective allocations to school infrastructure. The challenge will be to collect and integrate information from various sources that do not always clearly separate out school infrastructure expenditures. The results from this activity will be used in the projection of investment scenarios in step 6 and 7. 

Guidance:

The analysis of the budget allocation should take into account public funding, as well as any external sources that have been approved by the government and are predictable over time. In low-income countries, public spending tends to be low, and IFIs and development partners play a key role in financing investments in, for example, school infrastructure. Often, the government entities in charge do not receive regular allocations from the public budget and must rely on external sources of funding. For task teams doing this analysis, such external resources can be included as long as the funding covers a continuous period of time (that is, five years or more) and has been under the government’s oversight. 

Budget resources allocated for the maintenance of schools are limited and poorly defined. This lack of maintenance of school infrastructure is reflected in the limited information available on these activities. Funding for maintenance usually comes from central and local governments and even communities. It is important for task teams to collect all available information and to understand the budget resources allocated and the frequency and types of activities undertaken as part of maintenance.

Comparing the budget allocation and spending on education and school infrastructure across countries can be useful to inform the plan. The comparison of education and school infrastructure allocation in a given country with peer countries or the use of benchmarks from developed countries—such as Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) members—can provide key insights for the political economy of the plan. This comparative analysis can also be useful at the subnational level when, for example, comparing across cities or municipalities.

This analysis in a post-disaster context remains relevant even though the reconstruction budget allocation may be exceptional and determined by the extent of the impact. The resources allocated for the reconstruction of schools should be included in the analysis of the sector’s regular budget allocation. For the task team, it will be important to understand how and where these resources are distributed, in particular for the most affected areas. A surge of additional funds will also come from contributions by donors or international aid.

 

Activity 4.1.2. Analyze budget execution for school infrastructure

This activity is focused on understanding the sector’s capacity to spend on school infrastructure. The budget originally approved and allocated may vary from the actual resources spent as a result of factors ranging from administrative bottlenecks during implementation to emergency response activities after a disaster. Identifying these differences can provide opportunities to increase efficiency in the execution and allocation of resources. This activity builds on the information collected under activity 4.1.1 to track the annual average figures of the amount allocated, final amount executed, and remaining resources. 

Guidance:

The information on school infrastructure spending, which comes from different government levels, should be disaggregated accordingly. The analysis of overall spending capacity, in addition to other parameters identified under this step, will inform activities for the investment plan in step 7, while an understanding of the spending capacity by level of government will inform the implementation strategy (step 8). In developing countries, spending capacity tends to be lower at the subnational level, often due to limited human and technical resources. In decentralized contexts, local governments have strong participation in managing infrastructure investments; hence, identifying capacity-building needs and other areas for strengthening will ensure the plan’s implementation is not compromised as it moves forward.

This analysis should be led by relevant government officials. In particular, the ministries of finance and education should have both historical and current data on the budget, allocations, spending, and so on. Task teams should convene these key players and facilitate their participation to carry out this activity in line with the overall implementation of the RSRS and expected output(s).

To accelerate the pace of recovery from a disaster, spending capacity should be increased during the reconstruction process. To expedite the implementation of reconstruction work and related activities, the sector’s spending capacity can be increased by creating ad hoc implementation units or strengthening existing ones. Usually, these measures are temporary and will be discontinued as the reconstruction moves forward. For task teams, it will be essential to understand the sector’s approach to and capacity for managing these additional resources, as compared to normal conditions. The results of this analysis will inform activities in step 7. 

 

Module 4.2. Current investments in new and existing school infrastructure

Activities under this module will allow task teams to learn about the government’s resource allocations for new school infrastructure, particularly for vulnerability reduction interventions.

 

Activity 4.2.1. Identify historical and current investment programs for new school infrastructure

This activity aims to gain an understanding of past and current investments in new school infrastructure programs. The objective is to understand to what extent and how the sector has historically been financing the enhancement of school infrastructure capacity. This requires understanding the methods used to estimate the demand for new classrooms, the prioritization criteria (if any) used to allocate resources, the timeline of progress, and costs over time. Also important is information on the spatial distribution of these investments in urban and rural areas. 

Guidance:

This analysis should provide rich evidence of how the need for new infrastructure has been and is being addressed. It is possible, for example, to identify links between investments and demographic changes or even school building types built in different periods, thus helping the task teams understand the rationale behind the allocation of resources for new classrooms and anticipate the need for adjustments to meet future demand. 

New school infrastructure may be found to have design or construction flaws. In step 3, construction quality issues were analyzed. If quality issues are identified in the new infrastructure investments, task teams should collect information and discuss with the relevant agencies involved whether the issues relate to all of the investment program or just a portion. It is also important to understand what measures have been taken by the sector to overcome the issue in the future.  

In post-disaster conditions, this analysis provides insight about the existing capacity of construction services for school infrastructure. Existing school infrastructure programs can serve as a beneficial foundation for the reconstruction process, without which it would need to start from scratch. Task teams will need to gauge whether the expected investments for reconstruction are manageable for local construction firms or if complementary support is necessary.

 

Activity 4.2.2. Identify historical and current investment programs to repair or retrofit existing school infrastructure 

The aim of this activity is to gain an understanding of the past and current investments in existing school infrastructure programs. The objective is to learn how the sector historically has financed the interventions  (repair, rehabilitation, retrofits, or maintenance) in existing schools and the decision-making process that has been followed. It is to examine how these investment programs are defined and formulated, and whether they are articulated within a broader school infrastructure investment program and linked to any government priorities.

Guidance:

In the absence of national plans and/or school infrastructure programs, interventions and investments are addressed through a project portfolio approach, based on demands from local governments and school principals. The government entity in charge often receives requests from the subnational levels and even school principals, which are then consolidated in a school infrastructure project portfolio. As resources become available, these are distributed and allocated based on a set of criteria. With this approach, only a portion of the portfolio is commonly financed due to limited public resources. The inability to fund some projects implies some schools will not be served, and this can lead to problems with the principals of these schools and the communities in which they are located.

Investments in informal intervention projects should be excluded from the analysis. In general, these interventions are made with resources from communities and nongovernmental organizations and range from minor maintenance work to the construction of new floors or classrooms or new buildings in an existing school facility. They should not be combined with formal investments because they are not part of the public investment system, do not comply with the regulatory framework, cannot be considered permanent, and reflect an existing investment gap.    

Awareness of existing programs will facilitate their integration into the reconstruction plan. The reconstruction plan addresses not only the need for repair or replacement of affected school buildings, but also preexisting intervention needs. Indeed, in countries with good school infrastructure plans, reconstruction becomes an updated version of the existing plan. Thus, the analysis of historical investments sheds light on opportunities to leverage recovery efforts from subsequent programs.

 

Module 4.3. Financing investment system

Through this module, task teams will become familiar with the public investment system in the country and the decision-making process for school infrastructure investments.

 

Activity 4.3.1. Identify the funding mechanisms of current investments

The aim of this activity is to gain an understanding of the existing funding mechanisms used to finance school infrastructure investments. The objective of the task teams is to review, analyze, and describe all sources of financing used for school infrastructure, such as the education sector’s annual budget, transfers from the central government, internal and external loans, and donor contributions. The task teams are to work with the sector and with the ministry of finance to gain access to this information, which usually can be found in the ministry’s budgeting system.

Guidance:

Task teams should get to know the regulations and operating rules for the different funding mechanisms. Operating rules are established within the country’s public investment system, covering expenditure eligibility, accessibility conditions, priorities, implementation time frame, and reporting, among other areas. Two expenditure categories are widely used: operating expense (OpEx) and capital expense (CapEx). The former relates to regular expenditures needed to keep infrastructure operative while the latter relates to one-time expenditure to improve or enhance the condition and capacity of the infrastructure. Dedicated funding mechanisms may exist for each of these categories. For the design of the plan’s financial strategy (step 7), investments will be grouped by expenditure categories.      

In large-scale disasters, central governments use dedicated funding mechanisms for reconstruction. Task teams should familiarize themselves with reconstruction funding mechanisms so the plan’s financial strategy can be designed accordingly. Funding mechanisms in the RSRS refer to formal financial options established and administered by the government. Other financial contributions (from donors or nongovernmental organizations, for example), which may be particularly abundant in the recovery phase, can only be considered in the analysis if they have been officially integrated into the government’s financial strategy for reconstruction.

 

Activity 4.3.2. Identify investment requirements and key decision makers

The purpose of this activity is to map the detailed processes for mobilizing resources for school infrastructure and the decision-making processes corresponding to each funding mechanism. These are to be broken down into factors like eligibility criteria, application process, technical documents, spending time frame, and key decision makers. 

One objective of this activity is to recognize how central and local funding mechanisms are connected and, by that means, discover areas in which the education sector and municipalities can collaborate with the central government to inform future budgets. The decision-making process describes the chain of decisions made from the approval of submitted investment projects to the actual allocation of implementation resources, most of which are made by the ministries of finance, education, or public works.

Guidance:

From the analysis in this activity, task teams should be able to facilitate and improve the way decisions are made. We have observed that inefficiencies in the public project cycle stem from the poor quality and flow of information at each stage and trouble with arrangements to make decisions. The plan can make important contributions to each. The diagnosis phase constitutes a solid foundation for the definition of investment projects in subsequent stages. The primary purpose is to make a transition in the investment project design from a case by case to an intervention-at-scale approach. The analysis phase will unveil bottlenecks, gaps, and weaknesses through the investment design process and opportunities for simplification in the decision-making process.

This analysis reveals inadequacies in capacity among involved players that may ultimately affect efficiency in implementation. Low technical capacity within the government’s project units has a cascade effect on the whole project cycle. The quality of the technical documents and implementation provisions is often disputable, especially at a subnational level. Task teams should define the qualifications required of team members throughout the process so capacity-building needs can be integrated into the plan. This is as important as the formulation of the plan in some low-income countries, in which cases we recommend training programs as part of its kickoff activities.       

Customarily, fast-track procedures are created to provide access to reconstruction funding. Task teams should become acquainted with the detailed procedures related to the mobilization of school infrastructure resources. The reconstruction plan must provide the framework and required information for the formulation of investment projects. A fast-track option helps expedite the mobilization of resources but can also complicate the timely definition of investments and their formalization. For this reason, additional technical contributions from universities or other technical organizations to the design and formulation of reconstruction investment projects is highly desirable in the wake of large-scale disasters.

 

Output

The completion of activities under each module will result in one or more output(s). 

Module Output(s)
4.1 Institutional budget for school infrastructure 
  • Database and report: Main findings on the historical budget for the sector (general, educational, and school infrastructure budgets) and budget execution of school infrastructure investments
4.2 Current investments in new and existing infrastructure
  • Database and report: Main findings on historical and current investment programs for new and existing school infrastructure

Include reconstruction investments

4.3 Financing investment system 
  • Report: Current structure of the relevant ministry’s budget for school infrastructure investments, and main characteristics of the funding mechanisms

Include current structure of the relevant ministry's income for reconstruction of school infrastructure, and main characteristics of the funding mechanisms for post-disaster conditions