each civil servant - within 100 days. This helped identify those who were on the payroll, but not in active civil service and resulted in the suspension of payment of 728 salaries to ‘ghost’ individuals leading to monthly savings of approximately 60,000,000 Burundi Francs, reported the Director General of the MCS, Ms. Marie-Rosette Nizigiyimana. This is roughly equivalent to US $470,000 per annum (equivalent to the annual budget of the Ministry of Commerce) – a significant saving for a severely cash-strapped government budget.

From mid-2007 throughout 2008, the government launched numerous RRIs involving many ministries, including the above examples, and, in March 2009, it held a second high-level retreat to review the results of these cycles of initiatives. Over that time, RRIs broadly speaking had been used to institute mechanisms geared towards enhancing transparency and accountability within ministries and within the government as a whole. They had helped to reduce processes and increase awareness on the demand side. For example, in addition to the more expedient processing of payment of new civil servants, there was increased effectiveness and transparency in the Ministry of Justice through a reduction in the time it takes for copies of judgments to be made available from four days to just one day. Also, the amount of information being made available online was increased due to the establishment of a computerized database relating to the trade registry, securities and titles of credit. And in the Ministry of Energy, Water and Mining there was a reduction in the period of time taken between invoicing and collection, and an increase in collection rate of charges for drinking water from beneficiaries in rural areas (33 areas) from 12% to 80% of those serviced. Having these results presented at the retreat by ministries implementing RRIs provided the leadership with context and an evidence-base for informed decision-making and strategic planning about next steps. This was particularly important in light of the evolving priorities of the government two years on from the previous high-level leadership retreat, which was held in a very recently agreed post-conflict context.

This retreat also provided an opportunity to consider the extent to which the initial capacity development and learning goals had been reached, particularly in terms of project implementation and management. An additional key outcome of this retreat from the President and the Cabinet, who were encouraged by the broadened set of results across more ministries, was their endorsement of a decree (that was ultimately signed by the two Vice-Presidents in July 2009) to institutionalize the RRA as the preferred method for meeting the objectives of the Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP). The decree required each ministry to launch RRIs each trimester to make progress in meeting their respective sector priorities.<sup>17</sup> Having moved forward in implementing new RRIs, a third governmental cabinet retreat was held in March 2011 to review the results emanating from the additional cycles of RRIs conducted since the second retreat in 2009 and to launch the application of the new World Bank strategy for Africa 2011<sup>18</sup> in

> 17 Arrêté Conjoint No 121/VP1-VP2/006/2009 Portant Institutionalisation et Décentralisation de la Méthode des Résultats Rapides Comme Outil de Mise en Ouevre du Programme du Gouvernement, stating “the Rapid Results Approach would be institutionalized and decentralized... that it will be applied in all ministries and public services to support implementation of the PRSP...Within this framework each ministry will launch a new wave of RRIs each trimester... in line with the priorities of their sector”

> 18 World Bank, March 2011

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