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Making OVC-Friendly Policies at the National Level | |
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Step 4: Narrowing Down your Policy Options At this stage, you will have a long list of possible interventions, which must be scaled down to a financially feasible package of policies and interventions that is (a) within the capacity of the government and its partners to implement, (b) likely to have an impact on the groups of OVC you choose to prioritize, and (c) consistent with your goals, objectives and principles. To narrow down your list of options, you will need to come up with the best answers to each of the following questions.
Your answer to each question will be closely linked to the answers you gave to the preceding question(s). The first question, which relates to resource constraints, will condition your answers to each of the subsequent questions. It is likely that you will need to go through this exercise a number of times, as the gap between your intentions and what is realistically feasible becomes apparent. Below are some examples of how you might answer each of these questions as well as suggestions for ways to choose the best option. We have also developed a hypothetical example to illustrate the end result: Sample OVC Policy.doc.
1. How much funding can you afford to dedicate to addressing the special needs of OVC? The shape of your National OVC Policy is very much dependent upon the financial resources available to finance it. One option for coming up with a realistic funding level is to use present funding levels as the starting point and then establish two or three different scenarios in light of trends in social expenditures and likely donor contributions for the medium term. For example, in a country with a GDP of $37 billion, this could translate to an OVC budget of:
2. How should you prioritize the various OVC categories? Possible alternatives include:
Within each category, you could prioritize further, for example, by choosing to focus on: (a) under 10 year olds, (b) girls, (c) the most vulnerable (e.g., double orphans rather than all orphans). Obviously, your answer depends upon the availability of funding, and you should probably identify a set of more stringent criteria to apply if your resources (financial and human) turn out to be insufficient. You might find the section on Targeting useful to decide which OVC groups your national policy should prioritize.
3. On which interventions or policy options should you focus your efforts? This step requires first screening the interventions you came up with during Step 2 (Identifying Possible Options) through a set of selection criteria as explained in the section Selecting a package of OVC-friendly interventions or project features. Click here for an example of ranking of possible interventions for orphans. Based upon our ranking exercise, the six top ranked interventions are: The final decision as to which of these programs will be implemented will depend upon the cost per beneficiary and number of OVC needing the service as compared to the funding constraints established at the beginning of this exercise. You may want to review the Costing section of this toolkit to see if it has any cost information related to the interventions you have prioritized. If not, you will need to come up with some rough estimates of program costs yourself. If you find that not one of the proposed interventions is feasible given the OVC categories you have chosen to prioritize, then you may need to go back and change your answer to question #2 narrowing down your criteria for prioritizing. Note that feasibility will not only be a question on money, but also of human resources, e.g., are there enough social workers, nurses, or pre-school teachers? If not, how long will it take to train them? Also, if you find that you could afford to serve more OVC than you originally chose to prioritize, then you can also decide to revise up the number of OVC groups you intend to serve.
4. Who should be responsible for implementing each policy or intervention? If it is clear that there is only one appropriate agency to implement a program, then include that agency as the only option. If there are more than one relevant agency, then take this opportunity to analyze the strengths and weaknesses of each vis-à-vis the selected program. Below is an example of what you might come up with in response to this question for each program
Click here for an example of a simple analytical tool you can use as you attempt to sort out the best agency for each program. In the process, try to avoid over-burdening any one ministry, while taking into account possibilities of synergies across programs, if they are both implemented by the same ministry. Also, keep in mind that in most cases you may have a main agency, but you will probably need the collaboration of others. Finally, if you have a ministry that is the only logical choice, yet it is a very weak ministry on the ground, you can consider sub-contracting NGOs to carry out the work at the district level.
5. How shall you ensure coordination among all of the key public and private partners during implementation? Possible options include:
Choosing the right option for your country will depend upon which of these groups already exist and have a demonstrated track record in implementing policies to serve vulnerable groups or children.
6. How should progress be monitored?
Monitoring and evaluation should be explicitly included in the policy and you should consider building in a rigorous impact evaluation from the beginning of the policy cycle to use as a fiscal/policy tool for later investments. In any case, you must have a base line and quantified targets with precise indicators. The costs of monitoring should be included in the overall costing of the policy, as it is an integral part of any intervention. For more information, go to the chapter on monitoring and evaluation.
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