IMF and World Bank Joint Staff Guidelines on PRSP Preparation Status Reports and Accompanying JSAs September 27, 2001

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If a country requests continued access to Fund concessional assistance, but has not completed its full PRSP within one year of its initial I-PRSP, it would be required to provide a report to the Boards of the Bank and the Fund indicating the progress that had been made in developing its full PRSP. The guidelines set out below are intended to assist countries in the preparation of reports on status of PRSP preparation and staff with respect to the accompanying Joint Staff Assessments (JSA). The principle underlying these guidelines is that the administrative burden on both countries and Bank-Fund staff should be minimized, since priority attention should remain on finalizing the full PRSP.

The PRSP Preparation Status Report can be short (2-4 single-spaced pages), but should address the following key questions:

1. What has been the progress in developing the full PRSP with respect to the timetable and action plan set out in the I-PRSP? In this regard, it is expected that the report would highlight progress and major constraints in the areas to be assessed in the forthcoming full PRSP (i.e., participation; poverty diagnosis; targets, indicators, and monitoring; and priority public policies), bearing in mind the issues raised by the staff in the earlier JSA.
   
   
2. To what extent (if any) has the timetable, road map, and/or expected completion date for the full PRSP been revised?
   
   
3. What additional steps are the authorities taking, including seeking technical assistance, to complete the full PRSP in coordination with civil society and external partners?

The accompanying JSA of a PRSP Preparation Status Report should also be short (1-2 single-spaced page) documents which provide the staff's views of the authorities' report with respect to the three questions set out above. In particular, staff would be expected to comment on the feasibility of the revised timetable and action plan, and the extent to which issues raised in the JSA of the I-PRSP have been or are being addressed. If the authorities are seeking technical assistance to complete their PRSP, the JSA should take a position as to whether this assistance is likely to be forthcoming and provide a likely schedule for its delivery.

If the staffs are satisfied that progress on the PRSP has been adequate overall, then the JSA would conclude with the following statement: "The staffs of the World Bank and IMF consider that progress on the development of the full PRSP, as evidenced by the PRSP Preparation Status Report, is satisfactory and provides a sound basis for continued access to Fund concessional assistance and IDA adjustment lending. The staffs recommend that the respective Executive Directors of the World Bank and the IMF reach the same conclusion."