Civil servants who participated in the Program for Strategic Planning and Policy Development (SPPD), which has been successfully completed after two and a half years, were presented with diplomas on Tuesday in Sarajevo. The program was financed to the value of $2.5 million by the European Union and the governments of the Netherlands and Norway, and implemented by the UNDP.

The program has sought to strengthen the capacity of public administration institutions in selected sectors, in the areas of strategic planning, policy development and program budgeting.

Johann Hesse, Head of the Operations Section for Economic Development, Natural Resources and Infrastructure at the EU Delegation to Bosnia and Herzegovina said the concept of the program includes a very ambitious and broad objective in terms of supporting establishment of an accountable, professional, efficient and effective public administration in Bosnia and Herzegovina, that provides high quality services to the public and supports progress towards EU integration.

He said it was important for officials in BiH institutions to acquire expertise that will facilitate efficient and effective strategic planning and policy development. He stressed the importance of linking strategic planning with programming, strategies associated with local budgets.

"We do not need strategies that cannot be funded, they are just a dead letter. We do not want to spend money on something that is not in accordance with the strategic documents, because we want to know what the money is spent on," Hesse said.

He added that, after completing the SPPD, the key task is for program participants to put the expertise they have acquired into practice and to utilize strategic planning instruments.

Christina Ovestad Eikeland, First Secretary at the Norwegian Embassy, said donors may not see immediate results in this kind of project, as opposed to, for example, programs related to return, where you can clearly see how many houses have been rebuilt. However, she said the SPPD was already showing some successful results and it is crucial that these are sustained. For this to happen, she said, strategic planning must be adopted at all levels and a body to review management standards must be established.

Dutch Ambassador Sweder van Voorst tot Voorst said one tangible and very successful result of the program has been the adoption by the Federation Government of regulations on the development of public policy and strategic planning.

Resident UNDP Representative Yuris Afanasiev noted that 13 ministries at the state and entity levels had participated in the program, 300 officers were trained and 22 strategic documents were adopted. However, he pointed out that this constituted just one third of public administration employees, and this highlights the need to continue the program when funds are secured.

The program focused on the transport, energy, labor and employment, agriculture, social protection and SME sectors.