Project description

Title: Support for Implementation of the National Strategy for Accelerated Poverty Reduction (NSAPR)
Commissioned by: Bundesministerium für Wirtschaftliche Zusammenarbeit und Entwicklung (BMZ)
Country: Bangladesh
Lead executing agency: Economic Relations Division (ERD) of the Ministry of Finance of Bangladesh
Overall term: April 2006 to December 2007

Context

In October 2005, the Government of Bangladesh presented its national poverty reduction strategy paper "Unlocking the Potential – National Strategy for Accelerated Poverty Reduction". This strategy paper – now generally known by the abbreviation NSAPR – has been greeted with extensive international support. Reorientation of the country's entire budgetary and financial policy is intended to bring about long-term, sustainable success in regard to poverty reduction.
In Bangladesh, the national strategy paper for poverty reduction also provides a foundation for harmonising the work of the partners in development as resolved within the Paris Declaration (Paris Declaration on Aid Effectiveness – 2005). The aims are greater efficiency and lower costs. The measures of the partners in development are in future to be geared as much as possible to the development priorities and strategies of the NSAPR, with the aim of supporting the government as fully as possible with implementation of the strategy paper.

Objective

Improved German Technical Cooperation programmes and projects in Bangladesh are able to optimally support implementation of the national poverty reduction strategy.

Approach

Within the framework of implementation of the national poverty reduction strategy, the policy dialogue among all participants is being accompanied and supported with demand-driven, needs-responsive analyses and with position papers. Particular focus is on cross-cutting themes such as gender equality, good governance and anti- corruption measures.
Increasingly, standards based on the experience of German Development Cooperation are being used for the more precise and expert formulation of GTZ's position in the policy dialogue with the government and other development partners. In conclusion, the work conducted in Bangladesh is being assessed according to the extent to which it has contributed to poverty reduction. The results of the evaluation culminate in recommendations to the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ).

Results achieved so far

The work of GTZ is assessed according to its impact on poverty reduction and is sustainably geared to this objective. In the long term, German Technical Cooperation thus benefits poor population groups more directly.