A joint AfDB-World Bank mission is currently in the Central African Republic (CAR) conducting a Country Program Appraisal. The mission's objective is to take stock of current projects and establish a portfolio quality improvement plan, assess results and lessons learnt from the 2007-2010 Joint AfDB-WB Interim Strategy Document (JSD) and initiate discussions on the government's development priorities for the preparation of the new Joint AfDB-WB Strategy Document to be issued in 2009.
The team toured projects sites on 1 April followed, the next day, by strategic exchanges between the Government, WB, AfDB, and other partners on important issues such as the implementation of the JSD 2008-2010, the state of public finances, governance, implementation of the Post Conflict Country Facility and the Enhanced Highly Indebted Poor Countries Initiative, identification of government priorities for the new JSD, and resources allocation to CAR for IDA-15 and ADF-11.
A workshop was organized on 3 April on various aspects of project implementation, in particular, procurement and safeguard policies (WB).
The joint mission started work on 31 March with a performance review meeting with both organizations in the presence of the Prime Minister, Faustin Archange Touadera, the Minister of State for the Economy, Planning and International Cooperation, Sylvain Maliko, as well as ministers, the Country Operations Manager, the WB, the Chief Economist for CAR, Mary Barton-Dock, AfDB Lead Economist Issa Koussoubé, as well as a group of fifteen experts from both WB, the AfDB, and development partners in CAR.
