Joint Evaluation of Budget Support to the Kingdom of Morocco

This evaluation concerns all budget support implemented in Morocco between 2005 and 2012, representing more than 3.5 billion euros. This support was provided by seven Development Partners (DPs): the European Union (EU), the World Bank (WB), the African Development Bank (AfDB), the Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID), Agence Française de Développement (AFD), the Kreditanstalt für Wiederaufbau (KfW), and the European Investment Bank (EIB). A total of 54 programs were financed, mainly in nine sectors (education, health, water and sanitation, finance, transport, energy, social housing and human development, agriculture, and public governance).

The objective of this evaluation was to assess the extent to which the budget support granted to and implemented in Morocco helped to improve policies, strategies and public expenditure of the Government of Morocco in the sectors supported, with the goal of achieving i) development outcomes sustainable at the macro-economic and sectoral levels and ii) a positive impact on the achievement of Morocco's development goals. The evaluation further sought to provide recommendations to the DPs and to the Moroccan government for improvement of the effectiveness and efficiency of budget support. This evaluation was steered by the European Commission (EuropeAid, sponsor), Spain (Secretary-General for Development Cooperation – SGCID), France (AFD) and the Moroccan Ministry of the Economy and Finance.

As the budget support for the beneficiary’s budget was fungible, it is difficult to measure the outcomes and impacts of that support. This evaluation is based on the budget support evaluation methodology developed jointly by several development partners, including AFD, within the framework of the OECD/DAC Network on Development Evaluation. The evaluators analyzed the effects of the budget support on public policy in all the sectors concerned: education, health, water and sanitation, finance, transport, energy, social housing, agriculture, and public governance. The evaluation also proposed in-depth analysis of the education and health sectors, in which AFD provides budget support, and of the financial sector. The tools used were both qualitative (desk analysis, interviews in Europe, three missions to Morocco) and quantitative (analysis of budgetary data, descriptive statistics by sector and econometric analyses). This evaluation was carried out by a team of consultants from the firm ADE.

The budget support instrument proved to be relevant to the context of Morocco. The evaluation highlighted the strong coherence between the three inputs of the budget support: the flows of funding had limited direct effects, but they helped the technical support and the dialog on the sectoral policies to produce their effects. In terms of effectiveness, the budget support was a valuable tool for helping to guide the design and implementation of public policies. They enabled a strengthening of the credibility of the Moroccan reform program. They enabled the establishment of useful transaction costs, if not a reduction in them. However, the links between the budget support and the development outcomes in the sectors supported by budget support were more difficult to detect: positive effects were highlighted in the report, but it is often tricky to determine what the outcomes can be attributed to.

To take full advantage of the instrument, the report proposes the following:

• Stop using sub-sectoral approaches and adopt sectoral approaches and a more strategic dialog.
• Transform the budget into a tool for the implementation of government policy, by strengthening the national process of budget arbitrage.
• Shift from the support to reform, to the support to the implementation of results-oriented policies,so that budget support will have a lasting effect on the reduction of poverty and inequality, and on sustainable development.

See the evaluation summary.

See the evaluation report on this project (in French).

See the annexes of the evaluation report (in French).

Contact : Corinne de Peretti, evaluation officer (deperettic@afd.fr)