3.1. Institutional Framework and the Strategies of the Royal Government of Cambodia

The Rectangular Strategy of the Royal Government of Cambodia plays an important role in supporting the implementation of the political platform of the Royal Government in the third legislature of the National Assembly. The Rectangular Strategy is an integrated structure of interlocking rectangles, as follows: 1) enhancement of agricultural sector; 2) further rehabilitation and construction of physical infrastructure; 3) private sector development and employment generation; and 4) capacity building and human resource development. The Royal Government regards good governance as the core of the Rectangular Strategy.

The MoEYS is in particular involved with the rectangle's fourth part concerning Capacity Building and Human Resources Development: Enhancing capacity of human resources with high technical and scientific skills that effectively respond to labour market needs in term of entrepreneurship, high creativity, responsibility, discipline, morality, virtue, professional ethics, and honesty in an effort to promote development. In addition, the first rectangle on improving the agricultural sector includes life skills development which is also of concern for the Ministry.

The successful implementation of the strategies laid out in this paper is dependent on the larger on-going reforms within the public administration. The Public Financial Management Reform aims at achieving higher standards of management and accountability in government spending and revenue collection. MoEYS is committed to improving its financial management and monitoring systems of ESP programs and it anticipates being a pilot ministry for the PFM reform.

The Public Administrative Reform focuses on delivering public services to the people with quality and effectiveness and on creating a neutral, transparent, professional, responsive and responsible civil service. Special attention will be on moving public administration closer to the people consistent with strategy of decentralization and de-concentration and with the transfer of authority from upper to lower levels of the bureaucracy. This measure shall be facilitated by a clear definition of the roles, powers and responsibilities of the various authorities at the levels of the province, city, district and commune, as well as the introduction of information technology. Another aspect of this reform is to gradually raise the salaries of all civil servants by 10 to 15 per cent per year.

These general reforms are essential in order for the MoEYS to achieve its ambitious goals set out in the ESP/ESSP 2006-10, as for example increasing staff remuneration and improving performance monitoring and accountability of operational budgets.

The Royal Government recognizes that moving authority closer to the people can improve the quality of public services and increase participation. Key priorities in local governance are to build local management capacity, to provide reasonable levels of financial resources to the communes.