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One issue in the quality of projects is surely the real effect or impact we wish to obtain in the beneficiary countries. This has to do with concrete improvements in the living conditions of the populations in the areas addressed by development cooperation. We are all familiar with horror stories of some of the worst…
I can already hear the howls of frustration from committed development workers at this title. And in some way, you’re right: it is sometimes terribly difficult to obtain enough funds for some important development cooperation projects. And other ideas go unfinanced merely for lack of funds.
Let me say from the start: this blog series is not meant to offer a complete list of the challenges to bringing a good project idea to fruition, as that would probably take an encyclopaedia and be rather boring to boot. It is intended to provoke some thought on how improvements could be made.
In the previous blog we looked at the role of headquarters. Here the role of the field office is discussed, along with some of the pitfalls and how to solve them.
Having worked both in the field and at headquarters, I know the challenges and wishes of both. It is very difficult for international development organisations to find the right balance between sufficient headquarters control and a strong local presence in the beneficiary countries. Let’s look at the advantages and challenges on each side and analyse…
In every other business, an investment is expected to make economic sense. According to the Development Assistance Committee (DAC) of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), in 2006 some 104 billion US dollars were spent by the main donor countries on development cooperation. This is a massive investment, and any project or activity…
Why do many critics of development cooperation see marketplace distortion as one of the most critical issues? And what can be done about it?
Why do so many development cooperation projects run after their partners? Most projects operate on the premise that there is a project partner (often one of the “beneficiaries”) on the recipient side, who is fully committed to the project. He shares a common understanding of the overriding and the specific project goals and will work together…
