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The Monterrey Consensus, in addition to framing commitments for increased ODA, “codified” the call for development effectiveness. This call was reinforced in July 2002, when donors to the Bank’s International Development Association (IDA)—the world’s primary source of concessional (near-zero-interest) finance for development in the low-income countries—made replenishment contingent on the establishment of a results-based measurement system for IDA programs. IDA provides assistance to the world’s 82 poorest countries, 39 of which are in Africa. It is the single largest source of donor funds for basic social services in the poorest countries.

Donors agreed in March 2005 to a 14 th replenishment of IDA worth $33 million in new resources over three years. Now the 15 th replenishment of IDA is on the horizon, with donors expected to decide on contributions for the next three-year cycle by December 2007. IDA is at a watershed, in part because of debt relief contributions– IDA is providing $54 billion in debt reliefto poor countries: $18 billionunder the Heavily Indebted Poor Countries (HIPC) Initiative and $36 billion under the Multilateral Debt Relief Initiative (MDRI).This represents one third of IDA’s total resources and it lowers available credit reflows. Without additional resources, IDA would need to cut its financial support for poor countries currently benefiting from debt relief. For this reason, a generous replenishment of IDA is crucial.

Through its leadership on harmonization and alignment, IDA also leverages the assistance of other donors in support of country-owned programs and projects. These efforts are forging stronger partnerships between aid providers and recipient countries.

Given its unique capabilities and its track-record, IDA serves as a cornerstone of the international aid system in many poor countries. IDA’s platform ensures that aid is less fragmented, more predictable, and increasingly results-focused, which is fundamental to countries seeking to achieve the MDGs.

Harmonization, the Results Agenda and the Bank’s role

Central to the international community’s more unified approach is a concerted focus on development results.

The Third Roundtable on Managing for Development, held in Hanoi in February 2007 and involving the World Bank and a range of other donors, built on the findings of the 2004 Marrakech Second Roundtable on Better Measuring, Monitoring, and Managing for Development Results. The Hanoi meeting enabled delegations from selected developing countries to compare their experiences and to initiate a country action planning process, with targets for steps to be completed in advance of the Ghana High-Level Forum on Aid Effectiveness to be held in September 2008. The Hanoi Roundtable provided compelling evidence that country partners are eager to improve the effectiveness of development assistance and domestic resources by strengthening systems to enable information on expected and actual results to be used in decision making.

The inter-agency Common Performance Assessment System, or COMPAS initiative is developing common systems that all multilateral development banks can use to monitor their results orientation. Its 2006 report found that: efforts to implement country strategies are still weak in some cases; that performance based grants are on the rise; that efforts to apply operational lessons of experience are not systematic enough and that multilateral development banks are starting to link salary increases of staff to the accomplishment of agreed objectives.

Emmanuel Ayomide Praise is a world leading internet entreprenuer and investor. Some of his areas of interest include sport management,merchandise,ownership,internet entreprenuership,investments, media and writing amongst others.
Business URL: emmapraise.blogspot.com emmapraise.blogspot.com,

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The other day while watching a local Mexican TV show to improve my Spanish (yeah, right), this unsettling TV commercial was shown. Several teenagers, carrying their bottles of pop (the advertised product), wanted to go swimming at a public pool. Unfortunately, it was closed. They decided to break into the place.

They were clever in committing their criminal act. One girl took an instamatic picture of the undisturbed pool and taped it to the video security camera so the napping doofus security guard would see only the before-the-breaking-and-entering-scene on his monitors. Then over the wall they all went–chortling, frolicking and having all sorts of fun after they had just broken the law.

Soon the photo of the undisturbed pool scene blows off the security camera and the jig is up. The guard comes unglued and rushes into the pool area only to be overcome by a scene of fun-filled excitement. The next thing you know, he is drinking the advertised pop with the little law-breaking hooligans and starts having a gay old time.

I wonder what is going on here? Now, before you jump to any conclusions, let me tell you this. A well-known American soft drink company manufactures the soft drink advertised in this Mexican TV commercial—one you would immediately recognize if I had the guts to tell you the brand.

You know this commercial had to be produced in the United States (there wasn’t a Mexican among any of the actors) and approved by an American advertising executive who probably would say he or she thought the commercial was “cute”.

What is the message this TV commercial is sending to its ever-so-obvious target audience–teenagers?

1. If the object you are seeking is denied you then you should use whatever means necessary to get it.

2. Adults are stupid idiots that can be easily hoodwinked. But, if they catch you doing something wrong, you can still win them over with your youthful exuberance.

3. You can escape the consequences of wrongdoing by tricking or fooling adults.

Will someone tell me what this commercial has to do with the refreshing taste of a soft drink? No one in the ad ever talked about the drink. Remember what ads used to be like? “Yummy…This sure tastes good. It is so much better than that other icky soft drink. Won‘t you run out to the store and buy some?”

Whatever happened to TV commercials where someone talks about the product and compares it to the other brand with a sneering grimace on his or her face?

I realize that companies have to push their product somehow to make their stockholders happy campers. I am all for that. However, just how does a bunch of kids breaking into a closed swimming pool and seeking to deceive the security guard have anything to do with drinking the soft drink? And then, to show the adult in the commercial as incapable of thinking, “Oh! Perhaps I should call the cops and then detain these little varmints until the authorities can arrest their little butts and take them away.”

This is, I fear, NAFTA’s contribution to the Americanizing of Mexico. The Mexican airways are now full of senseless American advertising. The TV stations play commercials that show criminal acts or parental disobedience that are supposed to somehow make you want to run out and buy their wonderful products.

This makes me so mad that I think I shall switch to drinking something non-cola. Oops!

Doug Bower is a freelance writer and book author. His most recent writing credits include The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Houston Chronicle, The Philadelphia Inquirer, Associated Content, Transitions Abroad, International Living, Escape Artist, and The Front Porch Syndicate.

He is founder of zyworld.com/theolog/page14.htm Mexican Living Print & eBooks.