Project assistance utilisation
Divisions of 18 ministries fare badly
UNB
Eighteen ministries and divisions, including key ones like health, water resources and disaster management, performed very poorly in utilising their project assistances during the last fiscal year (FY15-16), reports UNB.
The utilisation rate on local resources portion by 20 ministries and divisions, including ministries of Posts and Telecommunications, Textiles and Jute, Bridges Division and Social Welfare, was also poor compared to the national average local resources utilisation rate (92 pc) during the last fiscal year.
This was revealed at an implementation progress review report of the RADP for fiscal year 2014-15 submitted before the National Economic Council (NEC) meeting recently. The Implementation Monitoring and Evaluation Division (IMED) of the Planning Ministry submitted the report.
According to the IMED, about Tk 71,143.72 crore was spent in the last fiscal year out of the revised ADP allocation of TK 77,836.05 crore, raising the implementation rate to 91 per cent.
The last fiscal year also witnessed Tk 11,384 crore more expenditure than the FY14-15. The ratio of expenditure of local resources, project assistance and organisations own fund in the RADP of last fiscal year reached 65:32:3.
Of the amount, Tk 46,079.71 crore was spent from the government exchequer which was 92 percent of the overall revised allocation in local resources.
The report said out of the total number of 1457 projects in the revised ADP of last year, the financial progress of 750 projects and the real progress of some 856 projects were laudable.
Talking to the news agency, an official at the IMED said the reasons behind low utilisation of project assistance portion for these ministries and divisions include delay in fund disbursement by the development partners, low expenditure due to complexity in project revision, delay in getting no objection by the development partners, complexity in utilising the social and environmental safeguard policy at the project sites of aided projects.
Besides, he said the delay in fund disbursement, complexity in land acquisition, pending cases regarding land, not completing the procurement activities in time, are some of the main reasons for having low utilisation rate in the local resources portion of RADP in the last fiscal year.
The RADP implementation progress review report of the IMED also showed the implementation rate of the investment projects in the last fiscal year is 95 per cent, which is 4 per cent higher than the national average of 91 per cent.
On the other hand, the financial progress rate of the technical assistance projects in the last fiscal year is 85 per cent, which is 6 per cent less than the national average of 91 per cent.
The report said out of the total number of projects in the RADP, some 98 projects witnessed cent percent implementation rate, some 18 projects were declared completed in the last fiscal although those witnessed financial progress in between 51-75 per cent, one project was declared completed despite having only up to 50 per cent expenditure while the cumulative financial progress of some 68 projects is zero.
Meanwhile, another official at the IMED said successful implementation of the projects under the RADP mostly depends on intense monitoring by the implementation agencies and once it is ensured, quality and standard implementation is ensured to a great extent.
