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Project Performance Assessment Report : Colombia - Peace and Development Project - Report No. 127212 - June 25, 2018

Countries
Colombia
Sources
World Bank
Publication date
Origin
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Summary

Colombia has experienced internal armed conflict for the last 50 years. The conflict has been waged primarily in rural areas and over control of territory, particularly in regions characterized by weak institutions and, in many cases, corruption and cronyism, impunity, expansion of illicit crop cultivation, and weak civil society links to state institutions owing to lack of opportunities for participation (World Bank 2013:1). Over time, the conflict has spawned a complex array of non-state actors who have waged terror as a weapon of war. Specifically, their modus operandi has included systematic largescale human rights violations, such as public executions, disappearances, massacres, town take-overs, extortions, assassinations, kidnappings, and forced recruitment of children.

The internal armed conflict has had a negative impact on the social and economic development of the country. Armed conflict has disrupted the productive use of assets and work; it has hindered legal economic activity; and propelled families into limited employment and poverty (World Bank 2015). Conflict has generated millions of Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs). According to estimates from the Unit for the Assistance and Comprehensive Reparations to Victims, over 7 million people had been registered as IDPs in Colombia as of March 2018—amounting to 15 percent of the population. IDPs have lower standards of living compared to those who have not been displaced (World Bank 2015).

Against this backdrop of conflict and violence, the World Bank provided support through the Peace and Development Project (PDP) “to assist vulnerable, low-income and displaced populations in rural and urban communities in the conflict-affected regions to reduce the risk of their exposure to conflict and mitigate the negative impact of possible derived effects.” The PDP design included four main outcome areas based on assumptions that were required to achieve the Project Development Objective (PDO).
These outcome areas were:

• Outcome Area #1/Assumption: Achieving socioeconomic stabilization of vulnerable and displaced populations. The project understood socioeconomic stabilization as developing social, economic, and environmental assets through a community-driven approach and it assumed that these assets can “mitigate the negative effects of conflict.

• Outcome Area #2/Assumption: Strengthening institutions and organizations at the territorial level as a precondition for carrying out a community-driven approach to development.

• Outcome Area #3/Assumption: Fostering new relationship patterns based on positive values such as trust, reciprocity, and collective action, among others through community-driven development (CDD).

• Outcome Area #4/Assumption: Protecting individuals from conflict. The theory of change assumed that the “risk of exposure to conflict” can be reduced through the increased social cohesion generated by a community-driven approach to development.

• Woven throughout the project’s theory of change is also the assumption that increased social cohesion paired with socioeconomic stabilization can play a role in deterring displacement.

To achieve its PDO, the PDP financed small-scale subprojects and capacity building activities to ensure that subprojects were selected, designed, and implemented through a community-driven approach. Overall, the PDP and its additional financing targeted six regions comprising a total of nine departments and 117 municipalities.

The Independent Evaluation Group (IEG) assessed the project’s performance in the following way:

Relevance of Objective. The PDO was highly relevant to the country priorities and to the World Bank country strategies at both the appraisal and closing stages. However, the formulation of the PDO lacked clarity and was not logically sequenced. Specifically, the PDO formulation “jumps” from the aim of “assist[ing]” vulnerable groups and IDPs to reducing their risk of conflict exposure, without indicating “how” this would be achieved.
This lack of clarity in the formulation of the PDO affected the clarity of the project’s logical frame. Overall, considering that the PDO was highly relevant to country priorities and World Bank strategies, the relevance of the PDO is rated substantial.

Relevance of Design. Subproject activities aimed at improving local livelihoods and living conditions were relevant for “mitigating the negative impact of conflict.” In turn, the project financed activities to build capacity of organizations on the ground to enable the implementation of a CDD approach that could plausibly generate new relationship patterns, increase social cohesion and, thus, “reduce the risk of exposure to conflict.” Project activities could also, in principle, affect displacement rates since there is evidence that socioeconomic stabilization paired with strengthened social cohesion can deter displacement (Adhikari 2013; Engel and Ibanez 2007). However, deterring displacement can either increase or reduce the risk of exposure to conflict. Despite the complex link between deterring displacement and “reducing the risk of exposure to conflict,” the relevance of design is rated substantial.

Efficacy. The discussion of PDO efficacy is organized around two sub-objectives: (i) “mitigate the negative impact of possible derived effects” and (ii) “reduce risk of exposure to conflict.” The objective of “mitigate the negative impact of conflict” is rated substantial since the PDP contributed to socioeconomic stabilization through an increase in household assets and a positive, albeit not sustained, effect on food consumption.
Regarding the aim to “reduce the risk of exposure to conflict,” there is evidence that the PDP strengthened local institutions and organizations; increased beneficiary participation in formal and informal organizations as well as their participation in social networks that can provide economic, emergency, and legal support; and increased their likelihood of becoming leaders. However, the available evidence regarding protection against conflict is mixed. Overall, the “reduce the risk of exposure to conflict” objective is rated substantial.

Efficiency. Although implementation efficiency was substantial; the project lacked an adequate economic and financial analysis. At appraisal, the project did not attempt to calculate an ex-ante economic rate of return for the overall project given the demand driven nature of the activities. Instead, the project estimated the internal rate of return for a purposive sample of subprojects that was deemed to be representative of the subprojects to be financed under the PDP. At closing, the Implementation Completion Report (ICR) did not refer nor follow up on the exercise conducted at appraisal and, thus, did not discuss the extent to which the sampled subprojects at appraisal were representative of the subprojects financed under the PDP. Instead, the ICR conducted a cost analysis in which they compared the cost per beneficiary family between the PDP and the EU funded Peace Laboratory II (World Bank 2013). The analysis concluded that the PDP project has a lower cost per beneficiary family. However, it is not possible to say whether these two programs are exactly comparable and the chosen efficiency metric (i.e. cost per family) is not precise enough since demand-driven subprojects are so different from one another.
Comparing the PDP costs in terms of assets built, benefits provided, or financial viability of subprojects would have been a more sensible approach. Overall, considering these shortcomings, efficiency is rated modest