The Protection of Basic Services Partners: Under the leadership of the Government of Ethiopia and with the support of the World Bank, the UK, the African Development Bank, the European Commission, Ireland, the Netherlands, Germany, Italy, Austria, Spain, and Canada. HLF4 KNOWLEDGE AND INNOVATION SPACE

The Protection of Basic Services Project 2/4 Background Recognizing Ethiopias strong progress towards the MDGs, the Government of Ethiopia and its development partners introduced the Protection of Basic Services (PBS) Project in PBS promotes basic service delivery by ensuring continuous, harmonized, and coordinated funding to five priority sectors as defined in the Governments National Development Strategy. HLF4 KNOWLEDGE AND INNOVATION SPACE 2/4

Innovation The PBS Project ensures the transfer of funds to regional and district governments for basic service delivery. Through semi-annual performance reviews coordinated by the PBS Secretariat, the Project has opened new doors for a stronger dialogue between the Ministry of Finance, other federal line ministries, and regional and district governments. The Project uses government public financial management systems to support decentralized service delivery. Stronger results monitoring at sub-national levels has improved the ability of donors and the Government to identify challenges and devise shared solutions. The PBS Project has also helped to avoid donor fragmentation by facilitating the involvement of many donors with different rules, constraints, and preferences, thereby increasing the aggregate funds provided to PBS. The Financial Transparency and Accountability and Social Accountability components of PBS have helped strengthen service delivery. Government officials now provide budget information to the public and citizens are being empowered to hold civil servants accountable. Objectives Expand access and improve the quality of basic services (education, health, agriculture, water supply and sanitation, and rural roads) to the poor. Increase transparency (especially financial information) and help citizens hold service providers accountable through the use of innovative social accountability tools. HLF4 KNOWLEDGE AND INNOVATION SPACE 3/4

Results PBS has helped improve the lives of more than 70 million Ethiopians. It has helped increase the net primary school enrollment rate from 68.5 to 87.9 percent, the child immunization rate from 70 to 82 percent, and rural access to potable water from 46 to 65.8 percent. PBS has also provided budget literacy training to 50,000 citizens resulting in modest improvements to civil servant accountability. Applicability The PBS Project design complements the use of country systems with dedicated financial resources for building system capacity. Through the PBS Secretariat, donors have dedicated human and financial resources to ensure coordination, harmonization, and alignment. The PBS Project has reduced donor fragmentation contributing to aid and development effectiveness. The Social Accountability and Financial Transparency components could apply elsewhere. 4/4 HLF4 KNOWLEDGE AND INNOVATION SPACE 4/4