08 Fall

Conference Summary The East Asia and Pacific Regional Conference on Community Driven Development (CDD)

October 29 - November 1, 2013

Bali, Indonesia

November 2013

Sustaining and Mainstreaming CDD Programs

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

Introduction .......................................................................................................................................................................... 2

Communities’ Trust and Confidence through Participation ............................................................................... 3

Political Support ................................................................................................................................................................... 4

Scale-Up of CDD .................................................................................................................................................................... 5

Capacity Building, Facilitators, and Role of NGOs/CSOs ...................................................................................... 5

Conclusion .............................................................................................................................................................................. 6

Annex 1: Conference Agenda .......................................................................................................................................... 7

Annex 2: Summary of Participants’ Feedback ....................................................................................................... 13

Annex 3: List of Participants ........................................................................................................................................ 16

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1. INTRODUCTION

The first East Asia and Pacific regional conference on Community Driven Development (CDD), “Sustaining and Mainstreaming CDD Programs,” was held in Bali, Indonesia from October 29 to November 1, 2013. The conference was co-hosted by The Asia Foundation (TAF), Australian Aid (DFAT), World Bank, and SMERU Research Institute. This event brought together over eighty participants, representing governments, civil society, and donor organizations. Representatives from eleven countries participated in the conference, including seven ASEAN countries (Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Myanmar, the Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam) plus Afghanistan, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, and Timor-Leste.

As a second generation of countries has begun to implement CDD programs, this conference provided an important opportunity for them to learn from the first generation programs, such as Indonesia, the Philippines, Thailand, and others. These countries from the first generation can also learn from each other. Some of the first generation programs have scaled up and are now operating at a national level. Many are also utilizing evaluation findings, independent critiques, field lessons learned, and national needs assessments.

The primary objectives of the conference were to facilitate a dialogue among country participants and to build the community of national stakeholders. Accordingly, policy and operational staff rather than academic and subject experts were invited to participate. To further encourage dynamic discussions among country participants, donor organizations were asked to hold back their comments and sat behind country participants in the double U-shaped seating arrangement as observers.

Throughout the conference, country participants were actively engaged in open and frank discussions. Most senior government officials were willing to discuss sensitive issues like the corruption in CDD programs and their efforts to reduce it. In sessions focused on specifically on the politics of CDD, country participants, though initially guarded, were ultimately comfortable sharing their thoughts on how best to “think and work political” to advance CDD goals.

Participants also took advantage of having experienced CDD practitioners from across Asia in one place and scheduled a number of south-south offline meetings and discussions prior to the conference and during session breaks. For example, requested by Samuel Mendonca, the Secretary of State for Local Development of the Ministry of State Administration, Timor-Leste organized a full-day “clinic” prior to the conference and exchanged knowledge and ideas with the colleagues from Afghanistan’s National Solidarity Program. Many participants brought questions and found answers, such as Afghanistan showing how to simplify reporting, Vietnam advising on livelihoods, Timor-Leste explaining how to integrate with district government.

In their feedback (Annex 2), participants addressed the benefits of having this type of regional south-south learning opportunity and engaging with a variety of major stakeholder in the CDD community, including civil society groups, policymakers, researchers, donor organizations. They expressed their interest in making the regional conference an annual or biennial event and also having other forms of south-south learning with other countries (country visit, cross-country internships, etc). Some participants proposed setting up a mailing list and/or a virtual platform on knowledge sharing for CDD practitioners. The next step is to determine how to institutionalize and sustain the south-south learning events and knowledge sharing.

During the conference, the discussions centered on topics, such as communities’ trust and confidence, political support, sustainability, scaling up CDD programs, convergence, capacity development, facilitators, and role of NGOs/CSOs. Participants shared their assessments of both critical success factors and major challenges in implementing CDD programs. This report summarized some key insights and points discussed over the course of the four-day event.

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Table 1: Key Factors for Success and the Challenges of Implementing CDD Programs

Key Factors for Success Key Challenges

1. Building communities’ trust and confidence through participation and encouraging them to take ownership and responsibility of CDD

2. Strong political support 3. Investment in human resources and capacity

building 4. Strengthening local government 5. Transparency and accountability

1. Sustainability of CDD programs 2. Lack of political support from the national

government and/or local leaders 3. Lack of human resources and capacity

(particularly lack of qualified facilitators) 4. Managing community expectations 5. Elite capture and corruption 6. Difficulty accessing remote areas as well as

conflict-affected or high security areas 7. Monitoring and evaluating the impact of CDD

program(s) 8. Involvement of NGOs and CSOs in CDD activities

2. COMMUNITIES’ TRUST AND CONFIDENCE

In many countries, local communities already manage, or in the recent past managed, most of their own affairs, but they often have difficulties when it comes to working as full and proactive partners with government. A community’s trust and confidence in its ability to engage effectively, and from their view successfully, with government can be improved through participation in CDD programs. The CDD approach recognizes the inherent capacity of most communities to take charge of many of their own development activities. These communities are often the best judge of the main binding constraints they face in improving their lives and livelihoods. CDD programs have demonstrated that, when provided with adequate resources and information, communities are able to identify and manage efforts to address those constraints. A community’s confidence in its capacity to work with government to these ends is then essential for ensuring that the sustainability of CDD.

In his keynote speech, the Indonesian Coordinating Minister of People’s Welfare, Agung Laksono, indicated that a community’s participation was one of the success factors for Indonesia’s CDD program because communities themselves designed and delivered the activities they needed. “When simple everyday people, no matter how strong or how weak their capacity may be, gain access to productive resources and the freedom to design, they turn into masters of their respective trade,” he said. Do Thanh Trung, Deputy Director of Central Highlands Poverty Reduction Project from the Ministry of Planning and Investment of Vietnam, also noted that the CDD approach increased participation and ownership which led to an increase in a community confidence.

Managing the expectations of community members is also necessary to build their trust and confidence in the CDD approach. In Solomon Islands, community members had a difficult time understanding the complex project design of CDD. Public outreach and advocacy were essential in clarifying the project limitations and making sure the beneficiaries understood the program. Unfortunately, the number of villagers in Cambodia who joined an open project design meeting decreased because the program was not able to meet the expectations of community members due to limited funding.

Measures to increase transparency and accountability were also implemented in order to gain a community’s trust in the program. In Afghanistan, NSP introduced the Notice Boards, posting information about the program in every village in an effort to enhance the transparency of the program. Both Vietnam and the Philippines implemented grievance redress mechanisms, in which community members could send complaints about the project and/or report corruption cases in order to strengthen social accountability.

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CDD is often adapted to ease tension and build social cohesion in conflict-affected and post-conflict situations. In southern Thailand, the government decided to use a CDD approach. With the support of civil society groups, non-governmental organizations, and the World Bank, the CDD pilot project was created based on what local people wanted in their community development in order to increase trust and reduce conflicts in the area. In conflict-affected areas of Mindanao, Philippines, the CDD program focused on human development of the communities so that community members would be able to lead the development themselves. Indonesian and Timor participants indicated that the CDD approach would promote togetherness (“gotong royong” in Indonesian) in communities.

3. POLITICAL SUPPORT

Having strong political support is essential for the CDD’s sustainability and scale-up. Some participants discussed the lack of political support from their national governments and local governments, while others shared their success in gaining political support for their CDD programs.

As it turns out, providing funds at the community level and putting citizens in charge of how they want to use them is also good electoral politics. In Indonesia, the National Program for Community Empowerment (PNPM) has been successful in engendering political support from five different administrations. The current President and Vice President have strongly supported expansion of CDD, and this is likely to be sustained under future national governments. In fact, CDD has being adopted at the local level, as in Aceh Province. With populist politics on the rise across Asia, CDD and CDD-like programs are likely to be seen as a useful way to garner local support. This can be a great boon to sustainability, but ensuring that CDD programs are able to evolve and adjust to improve, while avoiding distortion of CDD objectives and effectiveness will be an important challenge.

CDD also needs political support within government bureaucracies. Sujana Royat, Deputy Minister for Poverty Alleviation and Community Empowerment at the Coordinating Ministry of People’s Welfare, noted that PNPM was initially underestimated, but the program built a stronger basis as it continued to be successful. He further revealed that building partnerships with various stakeholders, even working with the opposition party, was important to further secure the program’s sustainability.

The Philippines has strong political support at the national level. The CDD program, called the Kapit-Bisig Laban sa Kahirapan-Comprehensive Integrated Delivery of Social Services (KALAHI-CIDSS), continues to receive the support from the new administration because of the past administration’s strong initiation to implement CDD as part of the national poverty reduction strategy.

In Timor-Leste, the CDD program, called Programa Nasional Dezenvolvimentu Suku (PNDS), has faced no political opposition. PNDS received the support of parliament because in a small country like Timor-Leste, politicians would not vote against popular needs, which was explained by Miguel Pereira de Carvalho, Director General of Local Development at the Ministry of State Administration and Territorial Management. He also indicated that the media played an important role in reporting the voting behavior of members of parliament.

However, the political support could be harmful rather than helpful, especially during a period of political transition. In the case of Afghanistan, hundreds of Community Development Council members were killed by an anti-government group because of their association with the national government.

Research can be used as a powerful tool in convincing policy makers to support CDD. Sudarno Sumarto, Advisor for Tim Nasional Percepatan Penanggulangan Kemiskinan (National Team for Accelerating Poverty Reduction: TNP2K) and Senior Research Fellow at SMERU, noted the importance of effectively linking the research with policy making in order that it becomes an integral part of the CDD program. Andrew Beath,

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Economist from the World Bank, pointed out that research would be helpful to improve the CDD program if researchers receive active input from practitioners and policy makers. Many participants expressed their interest in strengthening their monitoring and evaluation abilities, which would then lead into their research. In addition to research, Abdul Rahman Ayubi, Executive Director of Afghanistan’s National Solidarity Program, suggested that collecting success stories from the local communities would be helpful in conveying a positive message in order to gain the political and public support.

4. SCALE-UP OF CDD

Scaling up CDD programs would require the enabling environments for policy reforms, particularly in regard to fiscal decentralization, as well as the convergence with sector programs, in addition to having strong political support.

In Indonesia, the National Program for Community Empowerment (PNPM Mandiri) was officially launched in 2007 by expanding existing CDD initiatives, such as Kecamatan Development Program and Urban Poverty Program – now known as PNPM Rural and Urban. Since its launch, PNPM Mandiri became an integral part of community development throughout Indonesia. Even though the program had successfully scaled up to a national level, PNPM still faced the lack of support from the local governments and elite capture in the decision-making at the local level. As local governments were expected to play a greater role, PNPM introduced mechanisms to empower local governments, such as inclusion in designing the program, decentralization of funding, and knowledge transfer. Another challenge for the scale-up was integrating a CDD program with several line ministries. Sujana Royat, Deputy Minister for Poverty Alleviation and Community Empowerment of the Coordinating Ministry of People's Welfare, said that even though ministries refused the idea at the beginning, PNPM was able to convince them to integrate the CDD approach in the line ministries because of the strong endorsements received from ministers, such as Sri Mulyani, Boediono, and Aburizal Bakrie.

The Philippines were known to have a strong, decentralized government even before the KALAHI-CIDDS was introduced. The Local Government Code, which was passed in 1991, transferred significant responsibilities to empower the local government units. Local communities also became actively involved in various aspects of local government, including planning and budgetary processes. However, even in a decentralized government, KALAHI-CIDDS had some challenges in implementing a CDD program due to the passivity of local government units, lack of funding, and elite capture in the decision-making. It was important to continue working with the local governments to discuss plans, priorities and budgets to gain their support, explained by Benilda Redaja, National Project Manager of the KALAHI-CIDSS at the Department of Social Welfare and Development. KALAHI-CIDDS gradually gained support from the local leaders. In 2011, seventy mayors were invited to a meeting with the President to discuss the sustainability of KALAHI-CIDDS. Mayors requested the President to allocate a budget from the national government agencies to the local communities so that they could continue the program.

5. CAPACITY DEVELOPMENT, FACILITATORS, AND ROLE OF NGOS/CSOS

The capability of local governments and facilitators is widely considered to be pivotal for success of CDD programs. Lack of capability in local governments and scarcity of qualified facilitators are major concerns for most countries attending the conference.

Cambodia experienced poor performance by local government, but there was not enough funding or support for capacity development due to the limited budget for the local governments. Ngan Chamroeun, Deputy General Director of Local Administration of the Ministry of Interior and Deputy Chief, NCDD Secretariat

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noted that the National Committee for Sub-national Democratic Development (NCDD) had to rely on external funding for capacity development as it was not a priority for the local governments (their number one priority was infrastructure). Laos lacked qualified facilitators as the sub-district facilitators were volunteers and selected by the villagers. Sengphet Vannavong, Head of the Community Development Division of the Poverty Reduction Fund noted that facilitators sometimes had difficulty communicating the information to the beneficiaries because most of the facilitators could not read and write due to low education levels.

Capacity development requires a significant amount of time and resources; however, it is an essential upfront and ongoing investment. Recognizing the importance of trained facilitators, Timor-Leste decided to provide special training for community facilitators eight hours a day for eight months to help improve their knowledge and capacity. In Vietnam, investing in capacity development of the CDD staff led to a successful program and thus developed a positive reputation about the CDD approach to government leaders. Do Thanh Trung from Vietnam admitted it was expensive at the beginning, but once the capacity had been built, the implementation became much easier.

In addition to capacity development, most participants repeatedly expressed the importance of recruiting qualified facilitators. In Afghanistan, facilitators were usually recruited from the local communities because of their local knowledge and expertise. Abdul Rahman Ayubi, Executive Director of NSP, noted the strength of recruiting facilitators from local villages was that it would be very difficult for dishonest facilitators to continue living in the same village. To recruit more qualified facilitators, the Philippines’s KALAHI-CIDDS developed a standard of competences and had dialogues with universities to set up a certification program so that new graduates could become facilitators. However, in some cases, non-university graduates could still become facilitators as long as they had the requisite background and experience. KALAHI-CIDDS had been also trying to recruit facilitators from civil society organizations with experience in working on CDD.

As non-governmental organizations (NGOs) and civil society organizations (CSOs) had been working closely with community members in many countries, participants expressed their interest in engaging with NGOs and CSOs on various CDD activities. In Timor-Leste, NGOs and CSOs were involved in the developmental planning process in order to support the PNDS. They also asked to monitor the program. To enhance the capacity of NGOs and CSOs, PNDS planned to extend the capacity building training to NGOs and CSOs. In Afghanistan, NGOs have been taking a significant role in facilitating the program and reaching out to thousands of villages due to the weak capacity of the national government. In Thailand, the CDD program was carried out by a NGO, called Local Development Institute, and the results have been successful.

6. CONCLUSION

As CDD enters a new period, the conference provided a timely opportunity to reflect on what had and had not worked from previous CDD programs, and to pass on the lessons learned from older programs to the relatively new programs. The conference maximized opportunities for country CDD actors to build new professional relationships spanning the Asia Pacific region. Participants shared valuable experience and insights, such as how to build supportive and enabling environments for scaling up and to enhance a community’s trust and confidence. Participants also had a chance to identify some of the key challenges that still remain, including in some cases lack of political support, low capacity of local governments and facilitators, monitoring and evaluation, NGO/CSO involvement, corruption, etc.

To follow up on this year’s conference, participants expressed an interest in making the conference an annual or biennial event. Suggestions and ideas were offered for the next conference (see Annex 2). The conference was seen by many as a first step toward establishing a regional “community of practice”. A community of practice would foster knowledge exchange and communications among participants and would provide a learning platform for disseminating best practices and ways to avoid mistakes of the past, as well as to build professional relationships among CDD professionals across the region.

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ANNEX 1: CONFERENCE AGENDA

SUSTAINING AND MAINSTREAMING CDD PROGRAMS

PURPOSE:

Facilitate a dialogue among various actors (government officials, practitioners, implementers) who are working on community-driven development (CDD) programs from 7 ASEAN countries (Cambodia, Indonesia, Laos, Myanmar, The Philippines, Thailand, and Vietnam) plus Afghanistan, Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands, and Timor-Leste on challenges to sustain, mainstream, and scale up CDD programs;

Consider useful steps and activities that will facilitate a regional CDD community of practice; Establish a set of policy and implementation issues of concern particularly to the country participants that

could be addressed through research.

TUESDAY, OCT. 29 | DAY I – PUBLIC FORUM AND COUNTRY EXPERIENCE

8:30 - 9:00 AM REGISTRATION

OPENING SESSION

9:00 - 9:30 AM OPENING REMARKS

William Cole, Senior Director, Program Strategy

The Asia Foundation

Scott Guggenheim, Senior Policy Advisor

AusAID

9:30 - 10:30 PM SESSION 1 ORIGIN AND EVOLUTION OF NATIONAL CDD PROGRAMS

Ngan Chamroeun, Deputy General Director of Local Administration

Ministry of Interior and Deputy Chief, NCDD Secretariat, Cambodia

Tarmizi Karim, Director General of Village and Community Empowerment

Ministry of Home Affairs, Indonesia

Sengphet Vannavong, Head of the Community Development Division

Poverty Reduction Fund, Laos

Benilda Redaja, National Program Manager of KALAHI-CIDSS Project

Department of Social Welfare and Development, Philippines

Do Thanh Trung, Deputy Director of Central Highlands Poverty Reduction Project

Ministry of Planning and Investment, Vietnam

Facilitators: Scott Guggenheim, Senior Policy Advisor

AusAID

Abdul Rahman Ayubi, Executive Director

National Solidarity Program, Afghanistan

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In the first session, the representatives from the Philippines, Indonesia, Cambodia, Laos and Vietnam will explain

the genesis and evolution of their CDD programs.

Why did they start a CDD program in their countries?

What were the problems they were trying to solve the program?

What was the political context when they started the program?

How have their programs evolved over time?

10:30 - 10:45 AM COFFEE BREAK

10:45 - 12:00 PM SESSION 1 ORIGIN AND EVOLUTION OF NATIONAL CDD PROGRAMS (CONT.)

12:00 - 1:00 PM LUNCH BREAK

1:00 – 2:30 PM SESSION 2 ROLE OF CDD PROGRAMS IN CONFLICT OR POST-CONFLICT

SITUATIONS

Allan Daonga, Undersecretary

Ministry of Development Planning and Cooperation, Solomon Islands

Windel Diangcalan, Project Management Officer, Mindanao Reconstruction & Development

Bangsamoro Development Agency, The Philippines

Lamai Manakarn, Secretary General

Local Development Institute, Thailand

Abdul Rahman Ayubi, Executive Director

National Solidarity Program, Afghanistan

Facilitator: Miguel Pereira de Carvalho, Director General of Local Development

Ministry of State Administration and Territorial Management, Timor-Leste

In this session, representatives from Afghanistan, the Philippines (Mindanao), the Solomon Islands, and Thailand

will discuss some challenges of implementing CDD programs in the fragile and conflict-affected situations (FCS).

Why did they start a CDD program in the post conflict and/or conflict-affected situations?

What were the problems they were trying to solve through a CDD program?

What were the political contexts when they started the program?

What are the challenges of implementing the CDD programs unique in FCS?

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2:30 – 4:00 PM SESSION 3 NEW CDD PROGRAM: POLICY AND IMPLEMENTATION ISSUES OF

CONCERN

Miguel Pereira de Carvalho, Director General of Local Development

Ministry of State Administration and Territorial Management, Timor-Leste

Mana Kakarouts, CEO, Division of Community Development

Autonomous Bougainville Government, Papua New Guinea

Khant Zaw, Deputy Chief Engineer

Department of Rural Development, Myanmar

Facilitator: Sentot Surya Satria, Senior Social Development Specialist

The World Bank

In the last session of the day, the representatives from Myanmar, Papua New Guinea, and Timor-Leste will discuss

their concerns and challenges for launching a new CDD program as their programs are in the earlier stage.

Why did they start a CDD program in their countries?

What are the major concerns of starting a CDD program?

4:00 - 4:30 PM COFFEE BREAK

4:30 - 5:30 PM KEYNOTE SPEECH

Agung Laksono, Minister of Coordinating Ministry of People's Welfare, Indonesia

7:00 - 9:00 PM WELCOME DINNER

All participants are invited to the Welcome Dinner on the beach. Please meet in front of the hotel entrance at

6:30pm to take a bus to the beach.

WEDNESDAY, OCT. 30 | DAY II – POLITICS OF CDD

9:00 – 10:30 AM SESSION 4 POLITICAL CHALLENGES

Sujana Royat, Deputy Minister for Poverty Alleviation and Community Empowerment

Coordinating Ministry of People's Welfare, Indonesia

Miguel Pereira de Carvalho, Director General of Local Development

Ministry of State Administration and Territorial Management, Timor-Leste

Facilitator: Sandra Hamid, Country Representative of Indonesia

The Asia Foundation

The morning session will focus on the overarching political challenges of CDD programs. Participants will share

their experiences of working to establish and implement CDD programs given sometime challenging political

contexts. The focus will be on how one get political and administrative leadership to endorse, manage, improve,

and spread CDD programs. Some key issues and ideas to be addressed in this session include:

Building supportive coalitions

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Dealing with spoilers CDD and populist politics Building parliamentary support

10:30 - 10:45 AM COFFEE BREAK

10:45AM – 12:15 PM SESSION 5 POLITICAL TRANSITION

Abdul Rahman Ayubi, Executive Director

National Solidarity Program, Afghanistan

Chonlatee Yangtrong, Director, Bureau of Local Administrative Development

Department of Local Administration, Thailand

Facilitator: William Cole, Senior Director, Program Strategy and Innovation

The Asia Foundation

In this session, participants will discuss the challenges involved in maintaining and building support for CDD

programs through periods of political or security transitions. Such transitions can present both opportunities and

difficulties and there may be lessons that can be shared among CDD policy advocates and practitioners on how to

survive national elections, and how to navigate through major political and security transitions in a fragile state.

12:15 - 1:45 PM LUNCH BREAK

1:45 – 3:15 PM SESSION 6 BUILDING SUPPORTIVE NATIONAL POLICIES

Ngan Chamroeun, Deputy General Director of Local Administration

Ministry of Interior, Cambodia

Dickson Guina, Deputy Secretary

Department of Provincial and Local Government Affairs, Papua New Guinea

Cicero Juan Aguilar, Deputy National Manager of KALAHI-CIDSS Technical Support Services

Department of Social Welfare and Development, Philippines

Facilitator: Susan Wong, Sector Manager, Social Development

The World Bank

This session will focus on country experiences with institutionalizing CDD and participatory principles and

mechanisms in legal, policy and/or regulatory frameworks. How have different programs influenced national

laws, decentralization reforms, planning, and government budgetary, financing, and fiduciary practices?

Discussion should include exploration of factors that shape enabling environments for good policy, management,

and sustainability.

3:15 - 3:30 PM COFFEE BREAK

3:30 – 4:30 PM SESSION 6 BUILDING SUPPORTIVE NATIONAL PROGRAMS (CONT.)

4:30 – 5:00 PM SESSION 7 INFORMATION ON PNPM PROJECT SITE VISIT

Participants will be informed about the next day’s PNPM project site visit.

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THURSDAY, OCT. 31 | DAY III – PNPM PROJECT SITE VISIT

The third day of the conference includes the field visits to PNPM program sites in Balinese villages. The field visits

will provide an opportunity to see the Indonesia PNPM program in action and to strengthen relationships among

participants. Participants will be divided into two groups, which will each visit a selected project site and will have

discussions with CDD with local and district officials at that site. The detailed schedule of the field visit will be

shared on the second day of the conference.

FRIDAY, NOV. 1 | DAY IV – MANAGEMENT OF CDD PROGRAMS

9:00 – 10: 30 PM SESSION 8 CHALLENGES OF MANAGING CDD PROGRAMS

Bounkouang Souvannaphanh, Executive Director

Poverty Reduction Fund, Laos

Lottie Vaisekavea, Program Manager, Rural Development Program

Ministry of Development Planning and Cooperation, Solomon Islands

Nguyen Thi Minh Nghia, Deputy Director, Northern Mountains Poverty Reduction Project

Ministry of Planning and Investment, Vietnam

Facilitator: Laura Bailey, Country Manager of Papua New Guinea

The World Bank

In this session, participants will discuss the major challenges they are facing in managing CDD projects and how

these are being overcome. Among the issue to be discussed will be:

What adjustments/modifications need to take place in decentralized governance systems to accommodate and incorporate CDD programs? How can the financial costs of these adjustments best be covered?

What are some managerial steps that can be taken to scale up CDD programs in a country? (We will seek to highlight half dozen best innovative approaches used in the participating countries.)

What are the best ways to respond to corruption and other problems?

10:30 - 10:45 PM COFFEE BREAK

10:45 – 12: 15 PM SESSION 8 CHALLENGES OF MANAGING CDD PROGRAMS (CONT.)

12:15 - 1:45 PM LUNCH BREAK

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1:45 - 3:15 PM SESSION 9 EFFECTIVE USE OF RESEARCH IN POLICY MAKING

Suahasil Nazara, National Team for the Acceleration of Poverty Reduction

Office of the Vice President of the Republic of Indonesia

Andrew Beath, Economist

The World Bank

Facilitator: Susan Wong, Sector Manager, Social Development Department

The World Bank

This session will discuss some of the key policy research questions arising out of the current CDD literature and

how policy makers can use research to help inform their decisions. Participants will consider a possible research

agenda focusing on questions of particular concern to policymakers and CDD program managers.

3:15 - 3:30 PM COFFEE BREAK

3:30 - 4:30 PM SESSION 10 CONFERENCE WRAP-UP AND NEXT STEPS

Facilitators: William Cole and Scott Guggenheim

The last session of the conference will be an open plenary discussion reflecting on the discussions over the past

four days. Of particular importance will be determining: (1) what areas of continued discussion and future

collaboration within the Asia-Pacific group of countries might be useful, and (2) in what form might this best be

taken forward.

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ANNEX 2: THE SUMMARY OF PARTICIPANTS’ FEEDBACK

Overall Usefulness of the Conference:

All respondents found the conference useful. The total of 36 responses (55% response rate) were collected

from our participants – 19 responses from government counterparts and 17 responses from donors and civil

society representatives. All respondents found the conference to be useful, rated 3 or higher (see Table 1).

Eighty six percent of respondents rated 4 (very useful) or 5 (highly useful).

Table 2: Responses for the Usefulness of the Conference

Most Useful Aspects of the Conference:

Information sharing, interaction, and networking with other participants were the most useful aspects

of the conference, noted by many participants. Some participants thought exchanging challenges of

managing CDD programs and ideas for solution with other country participants were helpful for their work.

Politics of CDD was the most popular topic of the conference. The participants found the sessions on the

politics of CDD, such as Political Challenges, Political Transition, and Building Supportive National Policies,

and Role of CDD programs in Conflict or Post-Conflict Situations to be most helpful and interesting, followed

by two other sessions: 1) Origin and Evolution of National CDD Programs, and 2) Challenges of Managing

CDD Programs. Some key take away messages shared by participants included:

- Need for consistent and strong political support as to continue CDD operations and its sustainability; - Lessons learned and experiences about convergence on CDD implementation; - Importance of capacity building, particularly for facilitators; - How to mainstream CDD; and - How to deal with spoilers.

Valuable inputs shared by the Indonesian Government. Government counterparts noted that they found

the presentation and inputs about PNPM from the Indonesian Government representatives very helpful.

They were also able to learn valuable lessons from the PNPM field visit, which was organized by SMERU and

the World Bank Indonesia office.

In addition, some commented on the effectiveness of the seating arrangement (double U-shape) to put the

government counterparts in the inner circle as well as the usefulness of the country fact sheets.

Suggestions for Improvements:

More discussion time would improve the conference. One of the most common suggestions given by both

government counterparts and donors/civil society representatives was to have more discussion time in

1

(Not useful at all)

2 (Somewhat

useful)

3 (Fairly useful)

3.5 4

(Very useful)

5 (Highly useful)

Total

Country

Participants 0 0 1 0 12 6 19

Donors/Civil

Society 0 0 3 1 10 3 17

Total 0 0 4 1 22 9 36

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various forms, such as group discussion, longer Q&A, and longer breaks, as to allow for more interaction with

one another. Participants wished there was more time for questions and answers in each session. As an

example, one participant suggested a session format with 30 minute Q&A for each 10-minutes presentation.

As many participants preferred having more group discussions, one participant proposed including working

group discussions, instead of plenary sessions, by grouping countries with similar contexts and interests and

coming up with some ideas. Smaller and more focused discussions on key challenges would be most useful.

Introducing key themes and topics should be considered for the future conferences as to facilitate more

focused discussions. Some areas of interests included: monitoring and evaluations (M&E), transparency,

NGO/CSO participation, results on linkage between CDD programs and poverty reduction, streamlining

implementation process and procedures, and funding sources to support CDD programs for development

partners and donors.

Shortening and reviewing the presentations for quality check would also improve the conference because

many participants found most of the presentations to be too long and sometimes hard to follow. Considering

some language barriers for presenters, some recommended using PowerPoint presentations as well as

interpretation services for multiple languages so that participants, who were not fluent in English, could

express their ideas and thoughts more clearly and understand more easily.

Smaller groups and longer time on field visit would allow more discussions and interactions with

community facilitators and other project stakeholders. The field visit should showcase both good and bad

practices in the future field visits.

In addition, the participants also liked to see more engagement with CSO and community representatives in

discussions and reflect the input from local staff in all participating countries into the conference agenda.

Follow-up Steps:

Making this conference an annual or biennial event was one of the follow-up steps suggested by the

participants. Some suggested that the conference could be hosted in different countries by rotation. The

highlights of the conference should be shared with the participants, and results of this year’s conference

should be reflected in the next conference. Some participants noted inviting the same group of participants

to the next conference would be crucial to keep the continuation of the discussion while others expressed the

importance of including more civil society representatives, researchers, evaluators, policy makers, local

leaders, and CDD skeptics in the future discussions.

Creating a regional Community of Practice (CoP) would help facilitate knowledge exchange among

participants. Many participants expressed their interest in creating a regional CoP and continuing

knowledge and information sharing with other participants through emails and/or online platform. The

community of practice could be organized based on some key thematic issues. In terms of the online

platform, one participant suggested creating a web site (or page) that would consists of the information on:

1) how to scale up CDD program; 2) development market place; and 3) research and impact evaluation.

Another participant noted that the World Bank could enhance CDD resource repository by encouraging

project teams to contribute their resources and open it up to all client countries. Sharing materials,

documents, and evaluations would be most helpful as to avoid reinventing the wheel.

Staff exchange and country visit (south-south knowledge exchange) would be also helpful ways to learn

from other countries’ CDD programs and capitalize other people’s technical capacities and expertise, noted

15

by some government counterparts. They were also interested in organizing a training course for facilitators

in partnership with some countries that have successful CDD programs.

Exploring possible research agenda was also high on participants’ list of next steps. One participant

proposed conducting cross regional research on key policy and operational questions across CDD programs

and use the research as a basis for targeted ongoing exchange at the program manager level with some

policy maker engagement. Another participant was interested in looking into a system that effectively

prevents corruption in the CDD programs.

Most importantly, for the future conferences, government counterparts should articulate their needs

and interests, instead of having a donor-driven knowledge exchange.

16

ANNEX 3: EAP REGIONAL CDD CONFERENCE PARTICIPAT’S LIST

# Name Country Position Organization Email

COUNTRY PARTICIPANTS

1 Abdul Rahman Ayubi Afghanistan Executive Director National Solidarity Program a.rahman@nspafghanistan.org

2 Assadullah Daudzai Afghanistan Head, Capacity Development

Department National Solidarity Program a.daudzai@nspafghanistan.org

3 Jalaludin Hameed Afghanistan Head of MIS Department National Solidarity Program j.hameed@nspafghanistan.org

4 Ngan Chamroeun Cambodia

Deputy General Director of Local

Administration; Deputy Chief, NCDD

Secretariat

Ministry of Interior; National Committee

for Sub-National Democratic

Development - Secretariat (NCDD-S)

ngan.chamroeun@ncdd.gov.kh

5 Heng Chanthon Cambodia Executive Director Wathnakpheap (WP) director@wathnakpheap.org

6 Toch Pol Ponnlok Cambodia Senior National Policy Advisor to the

Secretariat of NCDD

National Committee for Sub-National

Democratic Development-Secretariat

(NCDD-S)

polponnlok@ncdd.gov.kh

7 Mutiara Aisyah Indonesia Communication Consultant, PNPM

Mandiri Oversight Team

Coordinating Ministry for People's

Welfare mutiara.aisyah@gmail.com

8 Tarmizi Karim Indonesia Director General of Village and

Community Empowerment Ministry of Home Affairs

9 Agung Laksono Indonesia Coordinating Minister Coordinating Ministry of People's

Welfare

10 Pamuji Lestari Indonesia Assistant Deputy for Community

Empowerment and Poverty Reduction Coordinating Ministry of People Welfare pamujilestari@gmail.com

11 Suahasil Nazara Indonesia National Team for the Acceleration of

Poverty Reduction

Office of the Vice President of the

Republic of Indonesia

suahasilnazara@tnp2k.go.id;

suahasilnazara@hotmail.com

12 Rudy Soeprihadi

Prawiradinata Indonesia Director of Poverty Reduction Bappenas

rudysp@bappenas.go.id;

rsprawirad@yahoo.com

13 Taufik Rinaldi Indonesia Secretariat of Pokja Pengendali PNPM

Mandiri

Coordinating Ministry for People's

Welfare tfrinaldi@gmail.com

14 Sujana Royat Indonesia Deputy Minister for Poverty Alleviation

and Community Empowerment

Coordinating Ministry of People's

Welfare

sroyat@gmail.com;

sroyat@menkokesra.go.id

15 Suhirman Indonesia

Assistant Professor on Policy Planning

and Development Management, School

of Architecture, Planning and Policy

Development

Institut Teknologi Bandung eshm2009@gmail.com;

suhirman@sappk.itb.ac.id

16 Kun Wildan Indonesia Director of Community Institution and

Training

Directorate General of Community and

Village Empowerment (PMD), Ministry

of Home Affairs

kwildan@gmail.com

17 Bounkouang

Souvannaphanh Lao PDR Executive Director Poverty Reduction Fund bounkouang@prflaos.org

18 Sengphet Vannavong Lao PDR Head of the Community Development

Division Poverty Reduction Fund sengphetvannavong@gmail.com

17

19 Kyaw Swar Aung Myanmar Deputy Director Department of Rural Development ksaung@gmail.com

20 Khant Zaw Myanmar Deputy Chief Engineer Department of Rural Development kzaw.dda@gmail.com

21 Dickson Guina Papua New

Guinea Deputy Secretary

Department of Provincial and Local

Government Affairs dguina@dplga.gov.pg

22 Mana Kakarouts Papua New

Guinea CEO

Division of Community Development,

Autonomous Bougainville Government

23 Gevo Mabone Papua New

Guinea Acting Director, External Liaison

Department of Provincial and Local

Government Affairs gevo.mabone@gmail.com

24 Cicero Juan Aguilar Philippines Deputy National Manager for Technical

Support Services of KALAHI-CIDSS

Department of Social Welfare and

Development ciceroaguilar@yahoo.com

25 Windel Diangcalan Philippines

Project Management Officer, Mindanao

Trust Fund-Reconstruction &

Development Program

Bangsamoro Development Agency windel_d@yahoo.com

26 Benilda Redaja Philippines National Project Manager, KALAHI-

CIDSS Project

Department of Social Welfare and

Development beredaja.kc@dswd.gov.ph

27 Edicio Dela Torre Philippines President E-Net Philippines ediciodelatorre@gmail.com

28 Allan Daonga Solomon

Islands Undersecretary

Ministry of Development Planning and

Cooperation daonga_allanchris@yahoo.com

29 Lottie Vaisekavea Solomon

Islands

Program Manager, Rural Development

Program

Ministry of Development Planning and

Cooperation lvaisekavea@sirdp.org.sb

30 Lamai Manakarn Thailand Secretary General Local Development Institute lmanagarn@gmail.com

31 Chonlatee Yangtrong Thailand Director, Bureau of Local

Administrative Development Department of Local Administration Cychonlateeya@gmail.com

32 Justino da Silva Timor-Leste President of the Board National Forum of NGOs justins917@gmail.com

33 Miguel Pereira de

Carvalho Timor-Leste Director General of Local Development

Ministry of State Administration and

Territorial Management miguelcarvalho76@yahoo.com

34 Samuel Mendonca Timor- Leste Secretary of State for Local

Development Ministry of State Administration samuel.mendonca135@yahoo.com

35 Aderito Guterres Timor-Leste Director of Administration, PNDS

Secretariat Ministry of State Administration aderito_guterres@yahoo.com

36 Lidia de Sousa Guterres Timor-Leste National Director of Financial De-

concentration Ministry of Finance lguterres@mof.gov.tl

37 Joaõ Jeronimo Timor-Leste Director General of Water and Sanitation

Services Ministry of Public Works jj_sas10@yahoo.com

38 Dulce Guterres Junior Timor- Leste Vice Director for Operational, PNDS

Secretariat Ministry of State Administration adu_dulce@yahoo.com.au

39 Nguyen Thi Minh

Nghia Vietnam Deputy Director

Northern Mountains Poverty Reduction

Project, Ministry of Planning and

Investment

mnghia2103@gmail.com

40 Do Thanh Trung Vietnam Deputy Director

Central Highlands Poverty Reduction

Project, Ministry of Planning and

Investment

trungdot@gmail.com

18

NON-COUNTRY PARTICIPANTS

41 Robert Brink Counsellor Governance AusAID Robert.Brink@ausaid.gov.au

42 Grant Follett Social Development Specialist AusAID Grant.Follett@ausaid.gov.au

43 Scott Guggenheim Senior Advisor AusAID Scott.Guggenheim@ausaid.gov.au

44 Patrick Hermanus Acting Senior Program Manager at

PNPM Unit, Indonesia AusAID Patrick.Hermanus@ausaid.gov.au

45 Karrie Mclaughlin M&E Advisor for PNDS, Timor-Leste AusAID Karrie.Mclaughlin@gfd.tl

46 Chloe Olliver Program Director, PNDS Support

Program, Timor-Leste AusAID Chloe.Olliver@ausaid.gov.au

47 Luke Simmons Second Secretary, Rural Livelihoods,

Solomon Islands AusAID Luke.Simmons@ausaid.gov.au

48 Arief Sugito Unit Manager for PNPM, Indonesia AusAID Arief.Sugito@ausaid.gov.au

49 Chanthanome

Sydavanh

Rural Infrastructure Program Manager,

Laos AusAID Chanthanome.Sydavanh@ausaid.gov.au

50 Laura Bailey Country Manager, Papua New Guinea World Bank lbailey@worldbank.org

51 Andrew Beath Economist World Bank abeath@worldbank.org

52 Sean Bradley Senior Social Development Specialist World Bank sbradley@worldbank.org

53 Gerda Gulo Operations Analyst, PSF - Indonesia World Bank ggulo@worldbank.org

54 Natasha Hayward Senior Social Development Specialist,

PSF – Indonesia World Bank nhayward@worldbank.org

55 Susanne Holste Lead Social Development Specialist,

PSF - Indonesia World Bank sholste@worldbank.org

56 Erik Caldwell Johnson Senior Operations Officer, PNG World Bank ejohnson1@worldbank.org

57 Sri Kuntari Social Development Specialist, PSF -

Indonesia World Bank skuntari@worldbank.org

58 Nikolas Myint Country Officer, Myanmar World Bank nmyint@worldbank.org

59 Kaori Oshima Social Development Specialist, Social

Development World Bank koshima@worldbank.org

60 Maria Loreto Padua Senior Social Development Specialist,

Philippines World Bank mpadua@worldbank.org

61 Caroline Sage Senior Social Development Specialist,

Philippines World Bank csage@worldbank.org

62 Sentot Surya Satria Senior Social Development Specialist,

PSF - Indonesia World Bank ssatria@worldbank.org

63 Bambang Soetono Social Development Specialist, PSF -

Indonesia World Bank bsoetono@worldbank.org

64 Matthew Stephens Senior Social Development Specialist,

Philippines World Bank mstephens@worldbank.org

19

65 Vo Thanh Son Senior Rural Development Specialist,

Vietnam World Bank svo@worldbank.org

66 Pamornrat

Tansanguanwong

Senior Social Development Specialist,

Thailand World Bank ptansanguanwong@worldbank.org

67 Ingo Wiederhofer Senior Operations Officer, Laos World Bank iwiederhofer@worldbank.org

68 Susan Wong Sector Manager, Social Development World Bank swong1@worldbank.org

69 Rob Wrobel Social Development Specialist, PSF -

Indonesia World Bank rwrobel@worldbank.org

70 Satornino Amaral Coordinator for Local Governance

Programs, Timor-Leste The Asia Foundation

SAmaral@asiafound.org

71 William Cole Senior Director, Program Strategy,

Innovation and Learning The Asia Foundation william.cole@asiafoundation.org

72 Silas Everett Country Representative, Cambodia The Asia Foundation SEverett@asiafound.org

73 Sandra Hamid Country Representative, Indonesia The Asia Foundation sandra.hamid@asiafoundation.org

74 Laurel MacLaren Deputy Country Representative,

Indonesia The Asia Foundation laurel.maclaren@asiafoundation.org

75 Megumi Makisaka Conference Coordinator The Asia Foundation MMakisaka@asiafound.org

76 Susan Marx Country Representative, Timor-Leste The Asia Foundation SMarx@asiafound.org

77 Sulton Mawardi Senior Researcher SMERU Research Institute sulton@smeru.or.id

78 Sudarno Sumarto SMERU Senior Research

Fellow/Advisor for TNP2K SMERU Research Institute ssumarto@smeru.or.id

79 Muhammad Syukri Senior Researcher SMERU Research Institute msyukri@smeru.or.id

80 Victor Bottini Advisor, TNP2K Office of the Vice President of the

Republic of Indonesia jvbottini@gmail.com

81 Richard Gnagey Advisor PNPM PMD Indonesia gnagey@indosat.net.id

82 Andi Tama Advisor, TNP2K Office of the Vice President of the

Republic of Indonesia andi.tama@tnp2k.go.id