PESHAWAR, Sept 28: The World Bank is concerned over the slow pace of work in the health and social protection sectors in the NWFP and it has asked the provincial government to keep the reforms initiative on track.

A mission of the international lending agency recently reviewed the performance of the Provincial Reform Programme (PRP-II) and noted that the authorities needed to redouble their efforts in order to ensure the adopted measures’ sustainability.

The PRP-II represents continuation of a World Bank-supported reform agenda introduced in 2003 through a Structural Adjustment Credit worth $270 million.

The first phase of the reforms programme ended in 2004-05 after which the PRP-II was put in place, also supported by the lending agency through another multi-million-dollar loan — the Development Policy Credit (DPC).

The finance department officials said the mission had pointed out that despite some progress there were impediments affecting the reforms process in the health, social protection and procurement sectors.

The mission said that in the health sector improving the utilisation and quality of primary healthcare services was essential. Under this component, the programme was supposed to support testing of managerial and organisational innovations to improve management of healthcare facilities.

However, two of the three models of innovations, including enhancing management authority and performance-based incentives in the public sector, were yet to be approved six months after the first appraisal of the DPC, said the mission.

Officials said the mission concluded that it was critical for the models to be approved and implemented, otherwise the whole approach was likely to fail.

Delays in the approval of a similar scheme supported by the Japanese Social Development Fund for earthquake rehabilitation in the Battagram district was highlighted by the World Bank mission in its assessment report, the officials said.

The grant agreement was signed in February after a consultative process led by the health department, but seven months later a contract remained to be signed by the implementation agency and the district government.

The lending agency pointed out that it was important that a contract was approved and signed, otherwise the Japanese grant would be cancelled, the official said.

Officials explained that the establishment of a social protection reform unit to coordinate, monitor and assess the social protection initiatives was badly needed.

The mission, however, pointed out that funds for the unit had not been released yet, adding that speedy action was needed to release funds for strengthening the social welfare department.

Slow progress on the subject of procurement reforms was also highlighted by the World Bank in its assessment. The mission noted that considerable time had been lost in utilising the Institutional Development Facility (IDF) grant worth $400,000 and appointing a consulting firm to revise the procurement rules.

The bank was seriously considering cancelling the grant, it maintained. The government has been asked to complete the process and notify revised rules and standard bidding documents.