Decentralization and Service Delivery

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Decentralization and Service Delivery

• Regina Birner
• Research Program
• Governance for Agricultural and Rural Development

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Background

• Decentralization worldwide
• Major policy trend
• Recent focus on democratic decentralization
• High hopes Bringing government closer to the
  people!
• More voice and accountability
• Better service delivery
• Priorities, access, quality of service
• Mixed empirical evidence worldwide
• Decentralization does not necessarily reduce
  poverty.
• Capacity and coordination problems at the local
  level
• Problems of local elite capture
• Decentralizing governance problems

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Challenges of decentralization
He participates, she participates, you
participate, . I decide.
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Decentralization in Africa
Extent of political, administrative and fiscal
decentralization (Score from 0 to 4)
Ndegwa (2002), World Bank
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Strategic Policy Questions

• Questions identified in stakeholder consultations
• How can decentralization be made more pro-poor?
• How can service delivery be made more effective
  and efficient?
• How can its access and utilization by the poor be
  improved?
• Goals of the Presentation
• Suggestions for research approach
• Review some available evidence
• Discuss research priorities

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Types of Public Services

• Public Services for Pro-poor Growth and
  Empowerment
• Education
• Health
• Water and Sanitation
• Agriculture
• Transport
• Administrative Institutions/Courts (Governance)
• Data Sources
• National Services Delivery Surveys in 2004 and
  2000
• Community Surveillance 1996 (9 Districts)

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Research Questions

• Analyzing the empirical evidence
• Access and quality
• To which extent do the poor have access to public
  services as compared to the non-poor?
• What is the quality of the services to which the
  poor have access as compared to the non-poor?
• Efficiency
• How efficient is the provision of services?
• Resources spent in relation to outputs achieved
• Which role does decentralization play for access,
  quality and efficiency of service delivery?
• Explaining changes over time
• Explaining variation across districts

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Factors Influencing Service Provision
Provision of public services Implementation of
projects Priorities, outreach, quality,
efficiency
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Insights from National Service Delivery Survey
(2004)

• Role of different levels of government
• Priorities
• Access
• Perceived quality

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Responsibility for Project Implementation
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PrioritiesProjects considered most important
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Water collection time (minutes)
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Access to SchoolsPercent distribution of pupils
by distance to school
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Perceived level of benefits for different types
of projects
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Policy reform options

• Strategies to make decentralization more
  effective and more pro-poor
• Example Agricultural Extension Reform
• National Agricultural Advisory Services (NAADS)
• Key objectives
• Empowering farmers, targeting the poor,
• mainstreaming gender issues, and
• deepening decentralization
• Design
• Farmers groups contract service providers
  (including NGOs)
• District-level coordinates with sub-county and
  local community level to manage contracts

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NAADS Institutional reforms
Demand side Involve farmers organizations in
decision-making
Measures to improve voice and accountability
(e.g., participatory planning)
Provision of public services Implementation of
projects and programs Priorities, outreach,
quality, efficiency
Measures to improve capacity of service
provision(e.g, training, competition)
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How effective is the reform of the agricultural
extension system?

• Study on Quantifying the Impact of the National
  Agricultural Advisory Services (NAADS) on Rural
  Livelihoods
• by Samuel Benin, Ephraim Nkonya, Gerosom Okecho,
  John Pender, Samuel Mugarura, Edward Kato
• Objectives
• To quantify the initial impacts of NAADS
• in the districts and sub-counties where the
  program was operating by 2002/03
• To provide a baseline for future impact
  evaluation studies
• Methods
• Survey of 116 farmer groups and 894 farmers in
• 6 trailblazing NAADS Districts (introduced in
  2001/02),4 late NAADS Districts (2002/03) and
  4 non-NAADs Districts

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NAADS was effective in reducing income losses
Percent change in household income between 2000
and 2004
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Some Policy Implicationsderived from the NAADS
study

• Enterprise targeting
• Need to identify farm enterprises that are
  profitable and can be adopted by a large number
  of farmers
• Identifying constraints to adoption
• Credit, input supplies, marketing
• Promoting sustainable natural resource management
• Adoption of improved seeds without soil fertility
  management may lead to nutrient mining.
• Taking care of remote areas
• NGOs as an important service provider less
  active in areas with low market access

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Proposed research issues - Summary

• Analyzing existing data on service delivery with
  regard to
• Access and quality by poor versus non-poor groups
• Analyzing variation among districts and changes
  over time
• Estimating efficiency in service provision
• Linking service provision data with expenditure
  data
• Evaluating the impact of policy strategies that
  aim at
• increasing voice accountability (demand-side)
• improving capacity for service delivery (supply
  side)
• Example NAADS Analysis of reforms in other
  sectors possible
• Issues
• Role of the public sector, private sector and
  civil society (NGOs, farmers associations) in
  service delivery
• Costs and benefits of different reform options
• Conditions that influence success of reforms

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Thank you!
Looking forward to your suggestions and comments
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Range of possible governance structures Example
Extension
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Framework for Analyzing Service Delivery
Fit
Example Agricultural Extenion Common framework
for ISNAR/EPTD/DSGD
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Explaining Performance

• Compare Lynn et al. Governance perspective on
  the public administration
• P f G, M, A, E, C, F
• where
• P Performance
• G Governance structures (degree of
  decentralization, functional differentiation)
• M Organization and management (incentives,
  leadership style, organizational culture)
• A Advisory techniques used (e.g., individual or
  group extension)
• E General political environment (general
  support to agriculture)
• C General capacity of potential service
  providers (public, private, third sector quality
  of information provided to extension system from
  research)
• F Characteristics of the farming systems and
  the clients (complexity of farming systems,
  education level of clients, collective action
  among clients)

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Analyzing fit of institutions with frame
conditions
Total costsTransaction costs other costs
Reduced transaction costs due to monitoring by
recipients
0

• Attributes of the transaction
• Measurability
• Care intensity

Efficient Boundaries of the State
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Strength versus Scope of the State
Strengthof state(Capacity)
Scope of the state (Range of functions)
Fukuyama, 2001