World Bank Engagement with Medium-Term Expenditure Frameworks
123
Table A.3 Combined Goals of Bank Engagement with MTEFs % of individual or combined objective in total number of products for each MTEF stage Goal Fiscal discipline Fiscal discipline + allocative efficiency Fiscal discipline + allocative efficiency + technical efficiency Fiscal discipline + technical efficiency Allocative efficiency Allocative efficiency + technical efficiency Total
MTFF
Pilot or full MTBF
60 40
100
17 17 32 17 17 100
Note: MTBF = medium-term budgetary framework; MTEF = medium-term expenditure framework; MTFF = medium-term fiscal framework.
strengthen allocative efficiency and technical efficiency, and 32 percent focused on improving all three objectives. Lending Operations Supporting MTEFs. To assess the quality of the MTEF-related Bank lending products, two types of ratings are considered: the ICR rating and the ISR rating. The ICR rating, which is used to report on closed Bank-financed operations, uses a five-point Likert scale: unsatisfactory, moderately unsatisfactory, satisfactory, moderately satisfactory, and highly satisfactory scores. The ISR rating, which is a monitoring tool for all current loans and credits financed by the Bank, applies an interval scale of 1–5, with 5 being the highest and 1 being the lowest score. The analysis in this section is based on a review of 242 ICRs. According to the ICR ratings, approximately 70 percent of the MTEF-related lending products were rated as satisfactory (see figure A.9). During the period 1999–2002, the number of completed lending operations rated as unsatisfactory was quite large, but it has declined since 2002. Since 2004 the share of completed projects rated as moderately satisfactory has increased. This suggests that newer projects have been performing relatively better. Similarly, since 2005 the ISR ratings show a growing number of projects rated 4 and a declining number of projects rated 1.
Conclusion Bank support for MTEF adoption and implementation has involved lending, AAA, and technical assistance products, implemented mainly by the PREM network, the HDN, and the FPD network. This support has