Evaluation purpose and scope

This is the fourth evaluation¹ in a series of Country Portfolio Evaluations (CPEs), which the Executive Board of the International Fund for Agricultural Development (IFAD) has requested the Office of Evaluation and Studies (OE) to undertake in those countries where a significant number of IFAD-financed projects have been carried out.

The purpose of the CPE is twofold:

(i) to assess overall portfolio performance, since the beginning of IFAD's operations in Pakistan, and its relevance to IFAD's main area of concern, targeting the rural poor; and

(ii) to make practical recommendations for improving project programming, design and implementation, drawing on lessons from IFAD's experience in the country to date.

The main report consists of ten chapters grouped under three general sections:

(i) Section one: "programme features and delivery": the Introduction is followed by a review of the evolving national context (Chapter II). The development of IFAD strategy, its salient features and portfolio of projects is discussed in Chapter III. Chapter IV is devoted to an analysis of delivery mechanisms in the light of the general implementation performance of IFAD-financed projects;

(ii) Section two: "main results by field of intervention" examines the extent to which IFAD projects have progressively increased target groups' access to irrigation water (Chapter V), rural infrastructure (Chapter VI), agricultural technology (Chapter VII), and agricultural credit (Chapter VIII); and

(iii) Section Three: "Socio-economic aspects" evaluates projects' benefits and their distribution, with particular reference to the targeting mechanisms used to reach the poor (Chapter IX); the section subsequently explores the potential for replication of the Aga Khan Rural Support Programme (AKRSP) model of participatory development in the light of IFAD's own experience in the country (Chapter X).

 The national context and IFAD's country strategy

The context in which IFAD's interventions have taken place has been marked by the sustained growth of Pakistan's agricultural sector. This satisfactory performance is a reflection of both a huge natural potential and government development policies, which consistently aimed at accelerating the modernization of agriculture.

Although they have been mentioned in the various Five Year Development Plans, social development and environmental protection objectives have had, de facto, a low priority in the Government of Pakistan's (GOP) strategies. A high incidence of poverty still exists in the country. Women's status, in particular, is very low. Cultural factors, unequal land ownership distribution, and budgetary allocations favouring urban groups, contribute to this state of affairs. There is also environmental degradation.

IFAD's commitments in Pakistan amount to USD 235 million. Cumulative loan amounts increased regularly from 1979 to 1984, remaining stable from 1984 to 1989, before increasing again at a sustained pace between 1990 and 1994.

Project funding commenced only after a broad strategy was drawn up and project identification undertaken. IFAD's intervention has been in two phases. The first generation projects, financed between 1979 and 1984, had a very wide geographic coverage, were concerned primarily with irrigated agriculture and provided credit for the acquisition of tractors and tubewells. The second generation projects were launched after three years, during which two special programming missions (SPM), in 1984 and 1987, contributed to IFAD's subsequent focus on specificity. These projects were more area-specific, targeted the rural poor especially women, and increasingly adopted a participatory approach.

In Pakistan, concern with targeting the poor has sharpened with time. Until the early 1980s, alleviating poverty meant contributing to the national food self-sufficiency objective, improving nutrition and creating employment. By the late 1980s, targeting strategy had become far more specific, focusing on the landless, rural women, and smallholders in difficult agro-ecological conditions. This progress has been made possible by the lead role the Fund has taken in project identification and formulation.

As line agencies have found it difficult to direct their interventions at the rural poor. GOP and IFAD further encouraged a participatory approach in implementation. Serious shortcomings remained, however, regarding programmes and instrumentalities for reaching the landless and those without assets. For example, the potential of non-farm income-generating activities to augment the incomes of the rural population was not considered until very late in the programme.

Project designers made a steady effort to identify the target group within the social strata in terms of resource ownership and earnings. This effort has been hampered, during implementation, by the inadequacy and/or untimeliness of critically needed baseline/benchmark surveys. Without adequate data on the social profile of the population in a project area, activities were difficult to target precisely as well as to evaluate.

1/ After Yemen (1991), The Sudan (1992) and Bangladesh (1993).