Southern African Regional Poverty Network (SARPN) SARPN thematic photo
Regional themes > Poverty reduction frameworks and critiques Last update: 2020-11-27  
leftnavspacer
Search







ILO

Poverty Reduction Strategy Papers (PRSPs): An assessment of the ILO’s experience

International Labour Office

Geneva, November 2002

SARPN acknowledges the ILO's intellectual ownership of this document
[Complete document - 118Kb ~ 1 min (15 pages)]     [ Share with a friend  ]

Introduction
  1. The development of the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP) process and the ILO’s role since its inception has been regularly reported to the Committee. A progress report on the ILO experience in the five pilot or special focus PRSP countries (Cambodia, Honduras, Mali, Nepal and the United Republic of Tanzania), which have been selected in collaboration with the World Bank and the IMF for a special effort to demonstrate the role of decent work in poverty reduction strategies, was provided to the Committee in November 2001.1 A further, more detailed assessment of the ILO’s PRSP experience, with a focus on two countries was requested by the Committee for discussion at the March 2002 Session of the Governing Body2 but time constraints meant that it was postponed to the November 2002 session. The present paper provides a revision and update of the March paper.


  2. The background to PRSPs is outlined below, followed by a discussion of the value added of the ILO and its social partners in contributing to PRSPs and helping low-income countries to design and implement them. The next section focuses on the practical steps taken by the ILO to integrate decent work into poverty reduction strategies (PRS) and to empower the ILO’s social partners to influence the process, focused on the experience over the past two years in the five special focus PRSP countries, with a particular emphasis on two of them.3 The paper concludes with a summary of key lessons learnt and a description of the challenges as the overall PRSP process moves from focus on design to a greater emphasis on implementation.

Footnotes:
  1. GB.282/ESP/3, paras. 9-20 and Appendix I.
  2. GB./282/9 and Add., para.77.
  3. Funding for these activities has come from the United Kingdom Department for International Development. Funding from the Government of the Netherlands has contributed to related work on capacity building for effective social dialogue in PRSPs.


Octoplus Information Solutions Top of page | Home | Contact SARPN | Disclaimer