DFID’s support to capital projects in Montserrat

Review

While continuing to meet basic needs, the Department for International Development’s (DFID) approach in Montserrat has changed to include a greater focus on economic development. Positive impact on beneficiaries has been achieved but DFID does not yet have a firm view on what Montserrat’s reasonable needs are nor what self-sufficiency means for the island. As a result of our findings this review is marked amber-red and made four recommendations.

Findings

While continuing to meet basic needs, DFID’s approach in Montserrat has changed to include a greater focus on improving economic development. DFID does not, however, have a firm view on what Montserrat’s reasonable needs are, nor what self-sufficiency means for the island; what is affordable to UK and Montserrat taxpayers; and how best to move towards self-sufficiency strategically and affordably over the long-term.

Although we saw evidence of good and necessary assistance to fund basic investment on Montserrat, we found that DFID needs to support the Government of Montserrat to develop a longer-term plan for the island to move towards economic, financially justifiable self-sufficiency.

Recommendations

1. DFID should develop a more detailed understanding of self-sufficiency for Montserrat. DFID should use this understanding with the Government of Montserrat to determine a realistic set of expectations over the medium term to improve economic, financially justifiable self-sufficiency.
2. DFID should support the Government of Montserrat to develop a longer-term plan for the island based on an agreed understanding of self-sufficiency. This needs to show how the different projects add up to a coherent impact on livelihoods and economic progress. It should set out the level and composition of financial and technical assistance and a projection of capital costs and necessary revenue support.
3. DFID should work with the Government of Montserrat to increase the engagement of the people of Montserrat in its projects. This is both to understand their perspective and to manage their expectations.
4. DFID, working with the FCO, should bring together the required actions and commitments from across Whitehall to achieve the aims of the 2012 White Paper for Montserrat and the other OTs so that best practice is built into future projects, programmes and policies.