Lessons Learned from Previous Projects

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1.7 Project Rationale and Benefits

1.7.1 Lessons Learned from Previous Projects

Recent Projects in DGH have provided examples of good performance to be emulated and poor performance to be addressed and corrected. The World Bank’s Implementation Completion Report for Eastern Indonesia Region Transport Project EIRTP-1, Eastern Indonesia Region Transport Project EIRTP-2 AND on going program Strategic Roads Infrastructure Project SRIP evaluated the performance of DGH and its Project Management Unit as “Satisfactory”. Specific comments were as follows: i. Readiness for Implementation. The experience in Indonesia of past and ongoing roads projects shows that implementation delays were mostly caused by slow procurement processes. In the Strategic Roads Infrastructure Project SRIP, the most similar project to WINRIP that is still ongoing, delays in the engagement of consulting services was the main cause of overall implementation delays. The same problem was encountered in the preparation of WINRIP with delays in contracting the preparationdesign consultant. Although the part of the problem related to the size and composition of procurement committees has been addressed at a systemic level through the Infrastructure Development Policy Loan IDPL series, delays in the procurement of consultant contracts persist. Timely engagement of the implementation support consulting services is the most critical issue to confirm the readiness for implementation. As such, preparation of the Request for Proposal package for these services must begin early to ensure the requisite consulting services are in place in a timely manner. ii. Quality of Engineering Designs. In the past, there have been some concerns over the poor quality of engineering designs because road sections were bid based on “final designs” that were less than full detailed engineering designs. The professional review of engineering designs introduced in SRIP has improved the quality of design, and will continue in WINRIP. The detailed engineering designs for WINRIP are to meet the same quality standards and specifications, in terms of detailed content and presentation, as those recently prepared for the Eastern Indonesia National Roads Improvement Project EINRIP. iii. Quality of Construction. The quality of works has been an issue in past projects, but largely improved in SRIP by a designation of the Design and Supervision Consultants as the “Engineer”, and b implementation of the enhanced monitoring aspects of the Anti- Corruption Action Plan. In addition to these improvements, WINRIP quality assurance measures will be strengthened through a system of enhanced independent technical audits, over and above those included in other projects. iv. Governance Enhancement. Past projects in Indonesia and elsewhere have shown that anti-corruption strategies that rely on either the addition of multiple layers of review andor the bypassing of governmental processes are often unsuccessful. Approaches that address systemic problems in government systems and enhance transparency are often more successful and sustainable. This Project would explore the use of computerized reporting and tracking systems, e-procurement and a well managed complaints handling mechanism for mitigating procurement related corruption and collusion risks.

v. Supervision-friendly design. Past road projects such as EIRTP-1 and 2 included many