# Increasing and Continuously Improving the Transparency of ODA Projects

Section 3

“ODA Review Final Report,” issued in June 2010, aims to promote an increase in the transparency (“Visualization”) of aid through the PDCA cycle; aid planning (Plan), implementation (Do), evaluation (Check) and follow-up activities (Act). The measures to be taken include improving accountability for ODA by involving third parties, clarifying the impact of aid, visualizing the current state and outcome of the projects and developing easy-to-understand evaluation reports. Having decided to increase the transparency of aid and strengthen information disclosure, the Government of Japan released “Toward Strategic and Effective Implementation of Aid: Full Visibility and Enhancement of the PDCA Cycle” in January 2011, which was followed by “Toward Strategic and Effective Implementation of Aid (Revised): Increasing and Continuously Improving the Transparency of ODA Projects” in October. (See page 150 for details regarding PDCA cycle.)

Below are the activities implemented in 2011. The Country Assistance Policy for individual countries was introduced at the planning stage. This is the aid policy for each country, formulated with the development plans of partner countries, development issues, etc., in mind, and taking into consideration the political, economic, and social circumstances of the recipient country. As a rule, Japan aims to have such policies formulated for all ODA target countries within three years. Japan will integrate past Country Assistance Programs for individual countries and the Rolling Plans that were formulated under them, reorganize them into a more concise and highly strategic plan, and strive to clarify the direction of aid through "selection and concentration." In addition, the Development Project Accountability Committee was established from the standpoint of strengthening the PDCA cycle related to implementation of individual projects, with its first meeting held in October 2011. The committee aims to ensure the appropriateness of individual projects of loan aid, grant aid, and technical cooperation at the preparatory survey stage, through the exchange of opinions with members of the committee, consisting of experts from the business community, the press and NGOs. At the evaluation stage, in April 2011, the evaluation function was transferred from the International Cooperation Bureau to the Minister's Secretariat, and along with establishing a new ODA Evaluation Division, an outside evaluation specialist was appointed as head of the Division, to strengthen the ODA evaluation structure within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and to enhance its independence. JICA decided to conduct a more detailed ex-post evaluation of projects that have the potential to provide beneficial lessons or models, as well as to add a searchable evaluation report database to JICA's website, and take other measures to raise the quality of evaluation and improve access to evaluation information.

In October 2010, a new website “ODA mieru-kasite” (website for visualization of ODA) was launched on the JICA website (a direct link from the ODA website of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs) to increase the visibility of ODA and promote public relations that further enable the acquisition of the understanding and support of the Japanese people regarding ODA. Photographs, prior/ex-post evaluations, and other information is posted as needed, in order to communicate to the people, in an easy-to-understand manner, an overview of each loan aid, grant aid, and technical cooperation projects that JICA is implementing as ODA projects around the world, as well as the process from project formation to completion. (A total of 455 postings had been made as of the end of September 2011.) By the end of FY2013, the Ministry plans to post information not only regarding projects that are currently underway, but on projects that have been completed over the past decade, and to provide information disclosure that is as comprehensive as possible. The posting of information as needed on the Ministry of Foreign Affairs website regarding Grant Aid for Japanese NGO Projects and other grant aid projects that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs takes the lead in implementing has also begun.

Website for visualization of ODA http://www.jica.go.jp/oda (Japanese only)