TNAG-0618-FCO40-766-Aid-framework-from-UK-to-Hong-Kong-1977 — Page 56

have identified really do reach down to those at the bottom of the income

scale whom we are trying to help. As we and other donors such as the

World Bank increase our involvement in poverty-focused projects we shall

learn from our and their experience, and our success in reaching the poor

should improve. One necessary element, on which we are now working, is

the identification of target groups on which projects will concentrate.

But even with a good project design success will never be assured, since projects tend to be constrained by the institutional and social framework in which they exist. Our experience is that projects tend to run into difficulties for political, administrative or organisational reasons, not on scientific or technical grounds. Unless there is real determination at the level of central government, local government and project management to ensure that the benefits of projects reach down to the very poor, there will always be a tendency for the better off to benefit in their stead. This emphasises the need for donors and recipients to pay close attention to the quality of institutions at all levels, from central government down to project management. These are matters to which we are now giving greater attention.

52. Project implementation. Problems here include manpower and local

costs.

In

53.

We have already referred briefly in Section III to the manpower problems of a poverty-focused aid strategy. Experts of high quality are needed. They must be technically proficient in their own discipline. But more important, they must provide project leadership and encourage the introduction of new practices or techniques while at the same time ensuring that local people remain fully involved in the project and are trained to take full responsibility for it when the foreign experts leave. addition to these qualities, the experts must be prepared to live in remote areas, often ill-served with housing, schools or medical services. Such people are rare, and the increasing emphasis which we and other aid donors are putting on rural development is increasing the demand for them. Already shortages are occurring in some disciplines such as agricultural economics and animal science. We are trying to overcome these by various training and retraining schemes, including schemes to give young and promising people experience of work in the rural areas of developing

countries.

54. Local costs are essential for most poverty-focused projects. We have reasonable flexibility in providing them, and in most countries they have not been a constraint. The difficulties have rather been in finding

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