Page 359 - Invited Paper Session (IPS) - Volume 2

IPS277 Matthew Shearing
sustainable. Experience shows that this has often been a successful mechanism
in terms of private sector companies innovating and investing resources (both
financial and intellectual) in creating proposals for the best way to deliver
statistical objectives. Project tenders are typically scored and awarded based
on overall price, methodology, and the team structure which is proposed; the
latter being informed by the strengths of the different types of partners
proposed, as set out in section 3.2.

Contracting mechanisms
Following successful competition between private sector service providers,
ongoing incentives need to be refined to ensure that the private sector follows
through on its potential to achieve high performance and sustainable
improvements. Managed correctly, this can provide greater assurance on the
quality of outputs and the efficiency of inputs than the often ambiguously
worded non-financial Memorandums of Understanding which underpin
typical bilateral NSO-NSO cooperation on capacitybuilding.
However, under-performance against objectives has been a problem in
some statistical capacitybuilding projects involving PPPs, as it has been for
much public-public sector cooperation. This has resulted from complex factors
that are difficult to assign to individual actors. The structures of contracts are
potentially to blame, as they have perhaps relied too heavily on negative
incentives such as the possibility of contract cancellation and/or non-payment
which are very difficult to enact. More importantly there has been a lack of
positive incentives for implementers to solve emerging challenges.
Improvements could include quantitative and qualitative objectives that could
be rewarded with additional financial gains if exceeded. Interventions using
the private sector could also better integrate sustainability by building in
targets/incentives for beneficiaries and implementers that are linked to
positive developments after a project’s formal closure; a 5-10-year timeframe
after project completion may be appropriate.

Investment seeking
Private sector actors are naturally willing to invest in securing future
revenue. This factor can lead to mutually beneficial outcomes and the
leveraging of finance from potential donor institutions. A key question then is
about how this potential for the private sector to raise revenue is currently
being suppressed. Evidence of any globally significant amount of private
sector fund-raising is thin.
A major challenge is probably the willingness of public sector institutions
in statistics to support this process. PPPs could be very powerful in lobbying
potential donors for financial support for statistical/data improvements,
particularly when such improvements are presented as adding value to wider

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