Jiangxi Shangrao Early Childhood Education Demonstration Program (RRP PRC 51434)

DEVELOPMENT COORDINATION

A. Major Development Partners: Strategic Foci and Key Activities

1. Shangrao is one of the 11 municipalities comprising Jiangxi Province, which forms part of the central region of the People’s Republic of China (PRC). The Shangrao Municipal Government began to receive major development assistance during the Twelfth Five-Year Plan, 2011–2015, when the Government of the PRC shifted its emphasis and efforts to rebalancing the economy and investments in the underdeveloped central and western regions. The World Bank has been the major development partner in Shangrao, providing a loan directly to the municipal government for the upgrading of Shangrao Sanqingshan Airport in 2013–2018. The World Bank also extended loans to the Jiangxi Provincial Government for the development of farm produce distribution systems in 2017–2020, under which one of the counties in Shangrao received support, and for lake and river restoration and improved wastewater management in two Shangrao counties in the Poyang Lake Basin (2017–2022). In 2018, the New Development Bank approved the loan to the Jiangxi Provincial Government for the upgrading of traditional industries to achieve energy conservation, emissions reduction, and better waste management, under which Shangrao is also covered (Table).

Major Development Partners Amount Development Partner Name of Operation Duration ($ million) World Bank Jiangxi Shangrao Sanqingshan Airport Project 2013–2018 50.0 World Bank Jiangxi Farm Produce Distribution System Development 2017–2020 6.0 Project (Yushan County) World Bank Poyang Lake Basin Town Water Environment Management 2017–2022 150.0 Project New Development Jiangxi Industrial Low Carbon Restructuring and Green 2018–2022 12.0 Bank Development Pilot Project Source: Shangrao Municipal Development and Reform Commission.

B. Institutional Arrangements and Processes for Development Coordination

2. At the national level, the Government of the PRC, especially the Ministry of Finance and the National Development and Reform Commission, coordinates development partners in all sectors, requesting them to align their operations with the PRC’s five-year plans for social and economic development. These institutional arrangements are mirrored at the provincial and municipal levels, including in Jiangxi Province, with the Jiangxi Provincial Finance Department, the Jiangxi Provincial Development and Reform Commission, the Shangrao Municipal Bureau of Finance, and the Shangrao Municipal Development and Reform Commission taking the lead in coordinating development partners in line with their five-year plans for social and economic development.

3. In early childhood education (ECE), the State Council sets overall strategic and policy directions, while the Ministry of Education issues national policies, plans, and guidelines. In Jiangxi Province, the Jiangxi Provincial Education Department develops provincial plans and guidelines within the national policy framework, while the municipal bureaus of education, including the Shangrao Municipal Bureau of Education, and county and district education bureaus follow the provincial plans and guidelines to develop their own plans and guidelines. Key strategic documents in the PRC and Jiangxi Province include the State Council’s Several Opinions on Deepening the Reform and Standardized Development of Preschool Education, 2020–2035 (2018), and Jiangxi Province’s Early Childhood Education Reform and Standardized 2

Development Implementation Plan, 2020–2035 (2019).1 The municipal government issued its Early Childhood Education Reform and Standardized Development Implementation Plan, 2020– 2035 in April 2020.2 The State Council’s opinions and the plans of Jiangxi Province and the municipal government guide the development and operations of ECE in Shangrao, including projects and programs supported by development partners.

4. In the education sector, ADB has worked closely with the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF), which is active in early childhood development and education in the PRC. ADB and UNICEF collaborated to conduct an education sector assessment in 2019, which covered ECE. ADB and the municipal government also drew lessons from a World Bank-financed ECE project in Yunnan Province in designing the program.3

5. The results-based lending (RBL) program supports sector-wide and programmatic approaches to comprehensive ECE system reforms in Shangrao, instead of a limited number of discrete interventions focusing on kindergartens in several counties. It provides a platform for development coordination based on a common program results framework, program expenditure framework, and program systems within the framework of the municipal government’s ECE Reform and Standardized Development Implementation Plan, of which the municipal government has strong ownership. The program will be fully incorporated in the upcoming Fourteenth Five- Year Plan, 2021–2025 of the municipal government. Program implementation will rely on the program systems, including program monitoring and reporting; financial management; procurement; and environmental, involuntary resettlement, and social safeguards. Necessary measures to strengthen government plans and program systems have been built into the program’s design.

C. Achievements and Issues

6. Overall strategic and policy directions for the ECE sector are clearly defined by the Ministry of Education, the Jiangxi Provincial Education Department, and the Shangrao Municipal Bureau of Education—especially in the State Council’s opinions, and in the plans of Jiangxi Province and the municipal government—which serve as a guide for development partners. However, the strategic and policy directions often remain general, leaving room for wide interpretation and sometimes confusion by county and district education bureaus, kindergartens, and providers of pre- and in-service ECE staff training programs. They therefore require further improvement. Development assistance in Shangrao has been provided for specific investments, rather than for the whole municipal system. The RBL program breaks away from this practice and enables better coordination and harmonization between development partners, while strengthening the government’s ownership of the program and program systems through the program implementation.

1 Central Committee of the Communist Party of China and State Council. 2018. Several Opinions on Deepening the Reform and Standardized Development of Preschool Education, 2020–2035. Beijing; and Jiangxi Provincial Government. 2019. Early Childhood Education Reform and Standardized Development Implementation Plan, 2020– 2035. Nanchang. 2 Communist Party of China Shangrao Municipal Committee and Shangrao Municipal People’s Government. 2020. Early Childhood Education Reform and Standardized Development Implementation Plan, 2020–2035. Shangrao. 3 World Bank. 2016. International Bank for Reconstruction and Development Project Appraisal Document on a Proposed Loan in the Amount of $50 Million to the People’s Republic of China for a Yunnan Early Childhood Education Innovation Project. Washington, DC. 3

D. Summary and Recommendations

7. The municipal government started to receive development assistance during the Twelfth Five-Year Plan, 2011–2015. Its five-year plans for social and economic development and other plans provide a guide for development partners to align their operations. However, their support has focused on specific investments rather than on the whole municipal system, rendering their sector-wide impacts less effective. Moreover, concentrating development assistance on specific investments has not necessarily led to improvements in the government plans, capacity, and systems. The design and implementation arrangements of the program reflect these findings.