PHN 1991 Sector Review 56 creasing wage employment; and (d) a Nutrition Fund for reducing the proportion of<sup>wasting and stunting</sup> in children and reducing the incidence of low birth weight and the prevalence of maternal malnutrition. In addition, the project will support an Employment and Poverty Policy Unit in the Ministry of Policy Planning and Implementation.

# EMENA Region

# _Algeria - Pilot Public Health Management Project_

The proposed project would help improve productivity and efficiency in the Algerian health care delivery system. It would introduce, on a pilot basis and in a limited area, management tools that will allow the Govemment to implement changes in the management and operations of the health system at central and local levels. These management tools would subsequently be extended nationwide. The pilot area would include the teaching hospital (CHU) and adjacent urban health district of Bab el Oued in Algiers, and the rural wilaya of Medea.

The project would: (a) improve resource management through the introduction of health managemeri and information systems for: (i) financial reporting and cost accounting, (ii) patient administraton, (iii) service and personnel performance evaluation, and (iv) building, medical and nonmedical maintenance; complemented by pre- and in-service training programs for managers and support staff; (b) improve quality of services by: (i) raising professional skills of public health sector personnel through stronger pre- and in-service training, and (ii) strengthening professional communication between health personnel at different levels; (c) improve the utilization of project area facilities through upgrading of their diagnostic and emergency handling capabilities and rehabilitation of basic systems such as electricity and water supply; and through the development of a masterplan for the teaching hospital of Bab el Oued; and (d) strengthen strategic planning and management in MOPH, including its capabilities to closely monitor and evaluate project results for eventual replication at national levels.

# _Egjpt - Social Fund Project_

As part of a continuing effort to ensure a social safety net associated with economic reform in Egypt, and in response to the adverse effects of the recent Gulf crisis, the proposed project will be the first phase of an overall program aimed at addressing the immediate and pressing needs of those most vulnerable to the reform process, in addition to facilitating the reintegration of Egyptian workers returning from Kuwait and Iraq. The proposed investments will focus on income and employment generation activities, and the provision of essential physical infrastructure and public services. The project will also include efforts to strengthen the Government's capacity to design and monitor future poverty alleviation policies and programs, and will establish mechanisms to protect selected target population groups (e.g., households that are dependent on unemployed workers, or that are headed by women) from the likely longer-term adverse social effects of adjustment.

# _Jordan - Emergency Recovery Project_

The project would support the Government's strategy for: (a) alleviation of some of the adverse effects of Jordan's economic adjustment program and the Gulf crisis on the poor in the short run, and (b) establishment of an institutional basis for targeted poverty reduction programs over the medium term. To this end, the project would help finance a new entity, the Development and Employment<sup>Fund (DEF),</sup> which is mandated to work with existing governmental and non-governmental organizations to create new productive employment opportunities targeted at households at or below the poverty line. DEF is