PRS Review: Uganda Case Study

Abstract

This largely desk-based report analyses the extent to which a selection of policies within Uganda’s Poverty Eradication Action Plan (PEAP). Uganda has been chosen as a country that fits into the category of countries that has a high proportion of chronically poor people within its population but which can be seen as a relatively good performer in terms of poverty reduction. In discussion with the CPR2 Team, the PEAP policies identified for analysis were the Plan for the Modernisation of Agriculture (PMA) and land reform policies with a specific focus on the implications for women. In terms of the CPR2 ‘Framework for Plausible Policies’, PMA can be characterised as a ‘growth-based’ strategy aimed at addressing the maintainers of poverty. Although the chronic poor do not form an explicit focus for the PMA, there was a perceived need for the PRS reviews to include a central focus on agricultural development policies. Moreover, the PMA is a centre-piece of the ruling regime’s long-term strategy of fostering pro-poor forms of structural change within Ugandan economy and society, and as such has a resonance with one of the central themes of CPR2. Our second policy focus, on land reform policies and their implications for women in particular, constitutes an effort to address issues of ‘Rights, Culture and Empowerment’, a policy area that in turn has close links to the CPR2 theme of securing social justice for the chronically poor. The 1998 Land Act can be seen as being more explicitly relevant to chronic poverty given that it was directly concerned with tenure security for women and orphans, and with issues of gender equity more broadly.This first draft of the Uganda PRS Review is based substantially on documentary-based research and also some interviews with key civil servants in Kampala over December 2006-January 2007. This research process has not been without its problems, including the difficulties in securing interviews with key informants over the festive season and in the run-up to the production of the latest Poverty Status Report. Moreover, the lack of progress in some elements of these policy areas, coupled with the absence of strong monitoring and evaluation systems has made it difficult to establish the causal impact that these policies may have had on chronic poverty.As such, however, both policies shed considerable light on the problems of implementation that surround PRS processes. As the report reveals, there are context specific reasons as to why implementation of these policy reforms has been problematic in Uganda, particularly in relation to certain institutional and political obstacles, and also a basic failure to sufficiently prioritise the issue of implementation within the PEAP process. However, the fact that implementation has proved to be a considerable difficulty in a country that is normally seen as one of the most successful examples of the PRS experiment should raise considerable concerns regarding the often exaggerated ambitions that have been placed on PRS processes.In particular, the Ugandan case suggests that the level of inter-sectoral co-ordination, administrative capacity, financial resources, and political will required to push through often controversial and wide-ranging policy reforms within PRSs should not be underestimated. Amongst the recommendations that we suggest might help to address these issues are: longer timeframes for PRSPs to enable a stronger focus on implementation; a greater clarity regarding sectoral responsibility and reduced ambitions for inter-sectoral co-ordination; and closer links to the budgetary process. Finally, we echo wider calls which suggest that donors should consider focusing their attention more on helping states to acquire the political capacities associated with developmental statism rather than insisting on the uptake of complex policy agendas.