SWAp Lessons-- The experiences of SWAp in Cambodia show that improved coordination does not necessarily mean pooling of resources but can be achieved through active participation by all the key stakeholders in the process of comprehensive needs assessment and joint strategic planning for the sector as a whole.²⁸ The phasing and sequencing of sector-wide coordination needs to go hand-in-hand with the development of the government’s capacity to manage the process at all levels. Key SWAp challenges remain that need to be considered in the next Programme of Cooperation for the period 2006-2010, namely i) accelerated capacity building of the MoEYS to cope with considerable expansion of its workload, fast pace of complex reforms, and its multiple programme partners; ii) the need for a consistently clear message from the MoEYS on key policy issues; and iii) the need for an even stronger Government capacity and initiative in the management of the SWAp process and lesser reliance on external technical advisers, especially in taking the lead in fiscal and policy analyses and formulation in an increasingly decentralizing context.

Technical Assistance-- While the extensive use of external technical assistance in the early phase of SWAp has helped achieved implementation of education reform in a relatively short period, it has resulted to limited capacity development of Ministry staff. The Ministry will adopt a gradual decrease of technical assistance and focus on capacity building of its staff at all levels.

Participation of Lower Levels in SWAp processes-- It has been recognized that the planning of reform agenda through the ESP/ESSP processes have been pursued mostly in a top-down and centralized manner, and Ministry staff at lower levels have been implementing reform initiatives without full awareness of the rationale for reforms —particularly at districts, communes, school clusters and schools. This concern was articulated during the SWAp seminar in June 2005 with concrete recommendations to address this problem.

Transactional Cost — In the last four years, Education SWAp in Cambodia has come a long way towards clearly setting the key priorities of the sector; mobilizing the technical and financial resources of all those concerned towards their achievement; and setting common standards/indicators and process by which both the government and its partners can jointly assess the progress made. At the same time, like any human endeavor, there are certain “transactional costs” incurred –in terms of time and resources necessary for interaction and coordination – which are often substantial. Needless to say, it is not a matter of whether coordination is necessary or not. The question to be addressed is how to manage the process most effectively and efficiently, keeping in mind the trade-off in time spent for different priorities and activities.

Attribution of Results under SWAp-- With the sector-wide approach, results are achieved through concerted and complementary interventions and actions by the Ministry supported by various donors following a single policy, financial and programme framework. Thus, it has become increasingly difficult to attribute achievement of sector results to specific donor contributions and actions—often a challenge to donors who are accountable to their Boards or Governments to deliver clear and specific results. Although it is difficult to precisely attribute specific result to a particular donor, it is nevertheless possible to pinpoint areas where substantial support and action had been provided by specific donors within the ESP/ESSP priorities. Thus it is still possible for donors—albeit imprecisely—to “claim” some contributions to specific outcomes and results achieved. The focus of SWAp is placed on achieving sector results and outcomes rather than inputs of individual donors—this was the message emphasized by the Sida resource person during the seminar to review SWAp experiences in Cambodia . ²⁹

Multiple dimensions of education reform-- Education reform needs to focus simultaneously on improving access and quality since achieving access without quality is a clearly a wasted investment³⁰. Cambodia for many years focused on expansion of access to primary education with less attention to quality. Like a number of other countries in the region ( e.g., Indonesia ) that adopted this approach, Cambodia is now faced with the big challenge to rapidly improve the quality of its basic education to meet the demands of the country’s development. Although at present, the demand for high quality skills is still low and adequately met; an inadequate supply may pose a serious constraint to future economic growth of Cambodia .³¹

²⁸ Mid-Term Review Report, RGoC-UNICEF Programme of Cooperation, October 2003.
²⁹ MoEYS-ESWG-NEP. Draft SWAp Semnar Report. June 2005.
³⁰ Ibid.
³¹ World Bank. Cristobal Ridao-Cano. Cambodia: Skills and Growth, May 2004.