Afghanistan Watch: Oxfam report: Serve the Essentials

October 31, 2006

Oxfam report: Serve the Essentials

This Oxfam report, subtitled “What governments and donors must do to improve,” approaches South Asia's development from a comparative perspective which, according to Jean Drèze of the Delhi School of Economics, “has been overlooked.” According to Drèze, the report “makes excellent use of this perspective by scrutinizing regional contrasts in South Asia -– between as well as within countries.”

There are some good insights and data here, but the recommendations tend to be overbroad to usefully apply to individual countries. Below are a few of the useful prescriptions:

· Governments should ensure “robust political commitment to the delivery of essential services” including elimination of user fees in education and heath. Universal delivery of essential services, rather than targeted programs, works better. Services must be especially sensitive to the needs of women.

· Governments to allocate at least 20% of annual expenditures to basic services (based on commitments at the Copenhagen summit in 1995); regulating private service providers to ensure quality standards and affordability is also key.

Some other specifics:

Teacher salaries should be at least 3.5 times the national per capita GDP.
The report identifies a shortfall of 800,000 teachers and 1.9 million health workers in South Asia (~50,000 of each in Afghanistan)
Create rural bias in service delivery through service contracts;
Employ and train more nurses rather than doctors.

Download the report here:

Serve the Essentials: What Governments and Donors must do to improve South Asia's Essential Services (pdf 894.6 kb)

Serve the Essentials: What Governments and Donors must do to improve South Asia's Essential Services. Chapters 3 and 4. (pdf 1.5 mb)

Posted by Carl Robichaud on October 31, 2006 at 10:00 AM in Economics, Health, Reconstruction | Permalink

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October 31, 2006

Oxfam report: Serve the Essentials

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