Rwanda case study

As part of our objective to build more evidence of the need for increased aid transparency, aidinfo recently conducted research in Rwanda to map the information available to the Rwandan government on aid flows. The study, which can be downloaded here, paints a picture of multiple and incompatible sources of data and evidence that, despite the effort that goes into maintaining these repositories, individuals within the government of Rwanda tend to go directly to donors or line ministry officials. This leads to duplication of effort and some resentment on the part of those who supply information.

The main reason for the available data repositories not being extensively used seems to be because of discrepancies between all of them resulting in a serious lack of clarity about the amount of project-based aid disbursed to Rwanda and, in many cases, the form in which this aid arrives.

The result of this lack of clarity over the volume of project aid is severe problems with aid management and with overall economic management in Rwanda.

The report concludes by suggesting that the International Aid Transparency Initiative (IATI) to establish a standard for aid information has the potential to address many of the shortcomings in the data on aid to Rwanda. The report recommends that to address the issues uncovered by this research, IATI should define a standard dataset with clear definitions of each data item. The Rwandan Development Assistance Database gives a good indication of a data set that would meet the needs of those using aid information in the Government of Rwanda.