Pakistan - Promoting Girls' Education In Balochistan Project (English)

Ratings for the Promoting Girls' Education in Balochistan Project for Pakistan were as follows: outcomes were highly satisfactory, the risk to development outcome was substantial, the Bank performance was satisfactory, and the Borrower performance was... See More + Ratings for the Promoting Girls' Education in Balochistan Project for Pakistan were as follows: outcomes were highly satisfactory, the risk to development outcome was substantial, the Bank performance was satisfactory, and the Borrower performance was also satisfactory. Some lessons learned included: the communities’ strong sense of ownership of schools contributed to enhancing girls’ education. Recruiting female teachers from the own community contributed to increased comfort among community members and developed a great role model for girls. A community-led model of needs identification provides a cost-effective solution to new school establishment, which can be adopted in similar, sparsely-populated places. In Balochistan, where low population density and sparse population is a constraint for service delivery, the PGEB tackled the problem by soliciting applications from communities and surveying communities to verify the actual needs of the set criteria. This approach enabled fast establishment of schools in communities, which have commitment and willingness to contribute to education, and increased access of children to school. Flexibility of project design toward achievement of objectives and quick decisions will ensure timely implementation and maximization of benefits. When it was found that there would be savings due to cancellation of some activities for security reasons, the PMU took an initiative to revise the procurement plan and the GoB made a quick decision to reallocate funds. Additional outputs, as listed in annex two, contributed to increase the beneficiaries and project outcomes by efficiently utilizing the available funds.  See Less -