The size of Korea's ODA projects, which started at 30 billion won in 1987, has steadily increased to around 2.2762 trillion won in 2014, but the ratio of ODA to GNI stood at 0.13% as of 2013, which is only half of the average of the 28 members of the OECD Development Assistance Committee (DAC) at 0.29%, ranking 22nd. Since 2006, Korea has declared several times that it would raise the ODA ratio to GNI to 0.25%, but the target will not be met as it seems that the ratio will not change significantly from the 2014 forecast of 0.16% based on the 2015 budget plan. Over the last 5 years, from 2008 to 2012, Korea's ODA project scale has grown at 18.8% which is far higher than the DAC members' average growth rate of 0.8%. However, more efforts should be made to expand ODA projects going forward.
At the same time, the evaluation of the ODA projects so far revealed the following areas for improvement.
First, the evaluation of the project planning phase found a lack of linkage between concessional loans and grants due to laws and the individual planning of institutions as well as a lack of connection between execution plans and budget plans. Therefore, in the 2nd basic planning, it is necessary to reinforce the linkage between concessional loans and grants as much as possible while raising and setting the ODA target at an executable level and to consider adjusting the proportion of concessional loans and grants through reviewing their differences, the ease of long-/short-term financing, trends in the international community, and the pros and cons of concessional loans and grants from recipient countries' perspectives, etc. Moreover, newly adding provisions related to the execution planning schedule and budget planning to the ｢International Development Cooperation Act｣ should be considered so that the National Assembly can examine the budget plan while referring to the execution plan.
Second, with regard to the project execution system, as there are inefficiencies due to scattered field resources of institutions including KOICA and EDCF, etc. who cannot constantly collaborate with each other, it is necessary to gather them together based on the recommendation of OECD DAC and the collaboration improvement plan by the government. Moreover, there are concerns that projects are executed in a poor manner if the required resources for execution are not secured properly in line with the fast-expanding ODA projects. As the labor costs of the resources for executing ODA projects is totaled as part of the ODA performance reported to the OECD annually, the minimized operation of required resources to save labor costs is a loss to not only the recipient countries but also to Korea, which needs to expand its assistance. Therefore, it is necessary to secure the appropriate resources in line with the continuously-expanding size of ODA projects.
Meanwhile, as KOICA's office workload related to contracts is substantial, reaching a level similar to the Public Procurement Service, and expected to continue to expand, it is necessary to request that the Public Procurement Service handle the work as much as possible in consideration of the expertise required in ODA contracts, etc.
Lastly, post-evaluation reports of the government found that there were cases where some projects showed a lower impact due to poor performance against their target and a lack of identification of regional characteristics. Moreover, there were cases where it was impossible to check project impact as the government presented only the outcome figures after the project was concluded without properly identifying the situation in the recipient country before project execution in its ODA project evaluation, and there was a low level of fairness and independence as the execution institution was directly evaluating (including research services) in the self-evaluation process of ODA projects.
Meanwhile, although the subcommittee for the evaluation of international development cooperation evaluated that Korea's overall ODA project quality has improved, there were cases where contents of evaluations or the selection of projects to be evaluated was inappropriate. Moreover, the ｢Enforcement Ordinance on the Basic Act on International Development Cooperation｣ mandates that ODA project results should be disclosed to the public through diverse methods including internet websites and press releases etc., but EDCF and the Committee for International Development Cooperation did not properly fulfill their disclosure responsibilities.
At the same time, the evaluation of the ODA projects so far revealed the following areas for improvement.
First, the evaluation of the project planning phase found a lack of linkage between concessional loans and grants due to laws and the individual planning of institutions as well as a lack of connection between execution plans and budget plans. Therefore, in the 2nd basic planning, it is necessary to reinforce the linkage between concessional loans and grants as much as possible while raising and setting the ODA target at an executable level and to consider adjusting the proportion of concessional loans and grants through reviewing their differences, the ease of long-/short-term financing, trends in the international community, and the pros and cons of concessional loans and grants from recipient countries' perspectives, etc. Moreover, newly adding provisions related to the execution planning schedule and budget planning to the ｢International Development Cooperation Act｣ should be considered so that the National Assembly can examine the budget plan while referring to the execution plan.
Second, with regard to the project execution system, as there are inefficiencies due to scattered field resources of institutions including KOICA and EDCF, etc. who cannot constantly collaborate with each other, it is necessary to gather them together based on the recommendation of OECD DAC and the collaboration improvement plan by the government. Moreover, there are concerns that projects are executed in a poor manner if the required resources for execution are not secured properly in line with the fast-expanding ODA projects. As the labor costs of the resources for executing ODA projects is totaled as part of the ODA performance reported to the OECD annually, the minimized operation of required resources to save labor costs is a loss to not only the recipient countries but also to Korea, which needs to expand its assistance. Therefore, it is necessary to secure the appropriate resources in line with the continuously-expanding size of ODA projects.
Meanwhile, as KOICA's office workload related to contracts is substantial, reaching a level similar to the Public Procurement Service, and expected to continue to expand, it is necessary to request that the Public Procurement Service handle the work as much as possible in consideration of the expertise required in ODA contracts, etc.
Lastly, post-evaluation reports of the government found that there were cases where some projects showed a lower impact due to poor performance against their target and a lack of identification of regional characteristics. Moreover, there were cases where it was impossible to check project impact as the government presented only the outcome figures after the project was concluded without properly identifying the situation in the recipient country before project execution in its ODA project evaluation, and there was a low level of fairness and independence as the execution institution was directly evaluating (including research services) in the self-evaluation process of ODA projects.
Meanwhile, although the subcommittee for the evaluation of international development cooperation evaluated that Korea's overall ODA project quality has improved, there were cases where contents of evaluations or the selection of projects to be evaluated was inappropriate. Moreover, the ｢Enforcement Ordinance on the Basic Act on International Development Cooperation｣ mandates that ODA project results should be disclosed to the public through diverse methods including internet websites and press releases etc., but EDCF and the Committee for International Development Cooperation did not properly fulfill their disclosure responsibilities.