Capacity Building in Africa: An OED Evaluation of World Bank Support

African countries must improve the performance of their public sectors if they are to achieve their stated goals of reducing poverty, accelerating economic growth, and providing better services to their citizens. The continued weakness of the public sector in most countries in the Region reflects deeply rooted conditions that are the legacy of such influences as colonialism, political conflict, and the underdevelopment of the private and nongovernmental sectors. Long-term, systemic approaches are required to build public sector capacity under these conditions. The Bank supports a wide range of capacity building interventions through both its country lending and nonlending programs and dedicated corporate and Regional entities. Between 1995 and 2004, it provided some $9 billion in lending and close to $900 million in grants and administrative budget to support capacity building in Africa. The bulk of this support has been directed toward the public sector. This independent OED evaluation assesses the relevance and effectiveness of Bank support for building public sector capacity in Sub-Saharan Africa over the past 10 years (1995-2004). It draws on in-depth case studies of Benin, Ethiopia, Ghana, Malawi, Mali, and Mozambique, which focused particularly on efforts in the roads, health, education, and public financial management sectors. The evaluation also assesses country strategies and individual operations across the Region, as well as the work of the World Bank Institute (WBI), the Bank’s Institutional Development Fund (IDF), and the Bank-supported African Capacity Building Foundation (ACF).