Monrovia – The World Bank strategy for Liberia’s development is “well aligned with the government’s own vision,” says Larisa Leshchenko, the Bank’s Country Manager.
Report by Alpha Daffae Senkpeni, [email protected]
Leshchenko says the Bank is currently thinking about continuing its programs in Liberia’s infrastructure, roads, and power supply and distribution, which will allow the “private sector develops much better and have better prospect.”
At the same time, she adds that the World Bank wants to strengthen its presence in the human development sector of the country by investing more in education.
She was speaking On Friday, June 1 at the media launch of the Country Partnership Framework (CPF) consultation for Liberia at the Bank’s office in Congo Town, Monrovia.
The CPF has four priority areas with its main focus on enhancing a productive-driven private sector, which would support job creation in the country.
It also focuses on key areas including building government’s institutional capacity – strengthening accountability and transparency of the public sector to create condition for the growth of the private sector; focuses on investing in human capital – putting much more resources into education; and the third component will look at minimizing the development gap between rural and urban communities by ensuring the country’s social benefits are equal shared.
“There are some parts of the country that are deprived – they are deprived of the road connectivity, economic opportunities, and many other things. So, from that point of view, we are looking at the third pillar as a glue that would somehow bring the country together in terms of improved access to services,” Leshchenko said.
The Bank is planning to hold consultations on the CPF in Ganta, Nimba County, Buchanan, Grand Bassa County and in Monrovia. It also plans to hold further consultations with the media, the civil society and other partners.
“We will share our ideas, but our main task for the next weeks is to hear back, because the devil is in the detail, and we want to understand better – how we can sharpen our own thinking and our own programs,” she said of the planned consultations with Liberians.
Henry Kerili, the World Bank Country Director for Ghana, Liberia, and Sierra Leone, earlier disclosed that a systematic country diagnostic for Liberia will be presented to the Bank’s board in the next couple of months.
It is the Bank’s assessment of key challenges and opportunities Liberia faces – and from such information, a partnership framework is developed, turned into a program of support to enhance Liberia’s development for the next five to six years with financing from the World Bank.
The Bank and other partners have US$70 million per year to implement projects in Liberia – 50 % grant and 50% soft lending to specific areas of the economy, Kerili said.
“We have started the process of preparation for the Country Partnership Framework, and we are now at the stage where we need to make a wide range of consultations with the government, with other development partners, with civil society, the media, academia and the public at large,” he said.
Samuel Tweah, Liberia’s Finance Minister, described the World Bank as a “most trusted partner” of the government and that the CPF is an “opportune moment to reset, re-calibrate and to recharge the mission of the World Bank” while Liberia develops its own national vision.
“The timing of this launch simultaneously with our development program provides ample opportunity for alignment,” Tweah said, inferring that the Bank’s programs are aligned with the government’s Pro-poor agenda.
He re-echoed government’s plan to invest in roads, human development, and agriculture, adding that partnering with the World Bank and other development partners would help improve the development space of the country.
But he stressed that although developing countries like Liberia faces resource challenge; they also face even more aggressive challenges of effectiveness and efficiency, citing incidents when resources are spent inefficiently contradicting development priorities.
He then emphasized the significance of spending on result-oriented programs that are expedient to Liberia’s development priorities.
“From a public financial management standpoint, from a delivery standpoint, (we need) to up the ante on effectiveness and efficiency,” the Liberian Finance Minister said, calling for better delivery from the government, better coordination and stronger partnership with the World Bank.
He disclosed that the World Bank and other partners will also be asked to share their perspectives on the government’s development plan – the pro-poor agenda.
Frank Ajilore, Resident Representative of the International Finance Corporation (IFC), added that expanding agriculture and supporting the private sector through infrastructure development would be a major pillar of Liberia’s economic transformation.
He also advised that the country needs to recoup foreign direct investment following the massive economic shocks of 2013 and 2014.
The private sector also has a view that there’s need to strengthen governance so that the efficiency of resources invested in development become a reality for the country, he said.
The IFC is looking to contribute to the strengthening of Liberia’s private sector under the CPF to enhance the agriculture sector and its value chain and help SMEs have access to financing on a long-term basis instead of the current 180 days.
“Three, four, five and seven years financing, two years grace period (the loan will be) in Liberian dollars that does not expose the local companies to currency risks,” Ajilore said.
Meanwhile, Madam Leshchenko disclosed that the World Bank is looking to scale-up its support to the agriculture and education sectors of the country.
She said the Bank has a US$25 million package to support the two sectors, assuring that more funding will be directed toward youth capacity development to make young people “much more active members of the labor market so that they can offer skills which are badly needed by the market.”
She added that more resources will also be directed to the fishery sector because it “provides opportunities for people to get employed and earn income