Resource information
The World Bank’s assistance strategies
showed strong client orientation and were aligned with
Uganda’s poverty reduction strategy. The programs were
substantially effective in decentralization, public sector
reform, growth and economic transformation, education, and
water and sanitation. However, more could have been done to
help counter the perception of increasing corruption,
improve power supply, reduce transport costs, enhance
agricultural productivity, and help with family planning and
reproductive health. The AfDB’s assistance was also relevant
and aligned with the government’s development goals. Its
support substantially achieved its objectives for
decentralization, public sector finance, growth and economic
transformation, improved competitiveness, agriculture, and
water and sanitation, as well as education and health.
However, there were some shortcomings in the assistance
provided for power and roads and in reducing corruption.
This report evaluates World Bank and African Development
Bank assistance to Uganda during 2001-07. The motivation to
undertake a joint evaluation was the shift to a common
strategic framework, the Uganda Joint Assistance Strategy
(UJAS), to guide the formulation and delivery of their
programs. Under a common strategic framework joint
evaluation is, in principal, more cost effective than the
equivalent separate evaluations, since at least some aspects
of the evaluation can be done together. This also helps to
reduce government transaction costs. The evaluation
discusses the outcome of the support of each bank, rates
each independently, noting that the two banks are of
different size, capacity, and institutional setting. In
addition, the two banks have programs that were not
implemented jointly but in parallel, although they regularly
engaged with one another as development partners. The
outcome ratings for the two institutions are therefore not
comparable and should not be used to imply that one
institution did ‘better’ than the other.
