Accelarating Progress Towards the MDGs: Capacity Development Issues

World leaders have pledged to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), including the overarching goal of cutting poverty in half by 2015. The Outcome Document from the 2010 MDG New York Summit has called for “renewed commitment, effective implementation and intensified collective action” to work on national development strategies, policies and approaches that have proved to be effective, with strengthened institutions at all levels, increased mobilization of resources for development, increased effectiveness of development cooperation and an enhanced global partnership for development.”  UNDP is expected to play a significant role in assisting countries in acting upon these Summit calls and has designated capacity development as the agency’s ‘over-arching contribution’ in UNDP’s development programming.

This report contributes to Capacity Development Group’s ongoing research agenda through a case-study analysis on institutions in three different countries: the International Health Partnership Compact (IHP) and Health Extension Programme (HEP) in Ethiopia; the Community-based Health Planning and Services Initiative (CHPS) in Ghana, and the state-owned water supply corporation NamWater and local Water Point Committees (WPCs) in Namibia. In each case, the team analyzed the capacities developed in the identified institutions and how these capacities have contributed to successfully addressing the relevant bottlenecks, which in turn has contributed to progress on MDG targets. The focus of the analysis is specifically on institutions and MDG achievement. Each institution/ pair of institutions have been examined have been examined through the lens of the six implementation bottlenecks to reaching MDG targets.