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Results and Performance of the World Bank Group 2022

Chapter 7 | Future Directions

The enhancements now included in World Bank Group (2021a) are expected to help address some of the issues identified in this RAP, but further enhancements to the guidance are identified in appendix I. We provide three future directions for the Bank Group’s consideration.

Enhancing the Effectiveness of World Bank Group Support at the Country Program Level

  • Improve the selectivity and framing of CPF objectives and the realism of Bank Group country programs, especially regarding implementation capacity and political challenges.
  • Prioritize implementation of the One Bank Group approach (including the Mobilizing Finance for Development agenda and the Cascade approach), a long-standing aim of the Bank Group.
  • Ensure that the Bank Group adapts and keeps pace with changing circumstances, such as shifts in government commitment or changes in Bank Group priorities, while being mindful not to lower the objectives to make up for the lack of progress. One option would be to consider the application, at the country level, of the M&E system currently applied to restructured projects at the World Bank.
  • Report in a timely way, in relevant documents (particularly in the Performance and Learning Review), any adaptations made to the country program and update the results frameworks accordingly.
  • Ensure that the Bank Group’s country program benefits from all elements of Bank Group support collectively and that the sum of the parts of Bank Group support is monitored.

Strengthening Risk Identification and Mitigation

  • Maintain the Bank Group’s current good performance on identifying macroeconomic risk and risks associated with external shocks while improving the identification of risks associated with implementation capacity and political economy.
  • Identify up front the possible key risk scenarios and outline the course of action to address those scenarios so that timely action can be taken, depending on which scenario unfolds.
  • Expand and update the current country engagement guidance to include possible key risk scenarios and the responses to each to facilitate better risk mitigation.

Strengthening Risk Identification and Mitigation

  • Maintain the Bank Group’s current good performance on identifying macroeconomic risk and risks associated with external shocks while improving the identification of risks associated with implementation capacity and political economy.
  • Identify up front the possible key risk scenarios and outline the course of action to address those scenarios so that timely action can be taken, depending on which scenario unfolds.
  • Expand and update the current country engagement guidance to include possible key risk scenarios and the responses to each to facilitate better risk mitigation.

Monitoring Advisory Services and Analytics Use or Influence

  • Systematically monitor and evaluate whether ASA are achieving their intended influence.
  • Consider introducing self-evaluation of analytical work across all Bank Group institutions.