Human Resource Development Board (HRDB)
13 December, 2010
9:15 – 1:30
Venue: Nastaran Hall of Kabul Serena Hotel
Draft Minutes
Co-Chair: Steering Committee: Sectoral Ministries
Dr. Attaullah Wahidyar, MoE MoLSAMD Absent
Mr. Jesper Andersen, Danish Embassy MoWA H.E. DM. Ms. Mostafavi H.E. DM. Sarwar Azizi
MoHE Mr. Quadir Amiryar Mr. Sediq Weera, HRDC
Denmark Mr. Farid Tanai Ms. Susan Wardak, MoE CIDA Mr. Chris Braeuel Mr. Gul Wahidi, MoE
Observers: France Ms. Laina Berkowitz Mr. Mirwais Masood (recording secretary)
Mr. Ernie Herzig, ISAF JICA Ms. Naomi Matsumoto Mr. Fred Hayward, MoHE
LTC Marianne DOHL, ISAF HQ Netherlands Absent Mr. Khawja Omari, CINOP
Mr. Sebastien Soulie, France Norway Mr. Anders Wirak Mr. Fahim Alamzai, HRDB
Ms. Renu Jain, USAID PACE-A Mr. Hafiz Nazarwall Mr. Iftikhar Ahmad, MoWA
Mr. Aref Arefee, UNESCO-IIEP SCA Mr. Andreas Stefansson Mr. Lutfullah Safi (MoE)
Sweden Mr. Sirajuddin Khalid Mr. Amir Mansory, TED/MoE
UNESCO Mr. Abdulhai Sofizada UNICEF Ms. Calister Mtalo
. USAID Mr. Chris McDermatt
World Bank Absent
Chamber of Commerce Absent
UNAMA Absent
India Absent
ANCB Absent GTZ (on behalf of Mr. Rudiger Blumor
German Embassy)
AusAid Mr. Peter Lzzard
Save the Children Absent
DFID Mr. Elyas Hashemi
SDC Mr. Ismail Qarzada
NZAID Absent
No. / Item / Discussion / Responsible / Action Points1. / Welcome and Introduction / · The meeting started with welcoming and introduction of participants since some participants were new to the meeting. Dr. Wahiydar commenting on the importance of the HRDB meeting stated that this meeting of HRDB is very crucial as it has to decide about the future course of HRDB and the integration process with Human Resource Development Cluster (HRDC).
· Since this was the last meeting of Dr. Wahidyar as Chair of HRDB before he leaves in January, Jesper as Co-Chair of the HRDB acknowledged his excellent leadership and contributions to HRDB. Mr. Chris Braeuel on behalf of the Canadian Embassy praised the passion, wisdom, openness and honesty that Dr. Wahidyar brought on education discussions.
· Dr. Wahidyar introduced and welcomed Mr. Sarwar Azizi, Acting Deputy Minister of TEVT replacing him as the Chair of HRDB. Mr. Amiryar welcoming Mr. Azizi mentioned that their support for HRDB will remain the same and MoHE admires the good work that the HRDB has contributed so far.
· The Chair commended contribution of Mr. Chris Braeuel to education of Afghan children and his support to Education Management Group as its co-Chair. It was last HRDB meeting of Mr. Braeuel as he is leaving the country in early January for his new duty station.
· The Chair also stated it is with supervise that Fred Hayward, the Technical Advisor for MoHE has to leave the country due to sudden closure of the USAID HEP program. He praised Mr. Hayward for his excellent contributions to higher education program in the country and said USAID needs to reconsider its decision as MoHE needs support of colleagues as Mr. Hayward.
· The Chair also introduced and welcomed Mr. Fahim Alamzi, the newly recruited technical coordinator of HRDB. / No Action
2. / Approval of the Agenda / · Agenda of the meeting was approved with only addition of sharing information on data collection exercise requested by Fast Track Initiative Secretariat under AOB. / HRDB Secretariat / Amend the Agenda
3.. / Approval of the Minutes / · Minutes of the 8 November 2010 HRDB meeting was approved with minor below changes suggested by Denmark Embassy:
o In point 4.1 on last bullet page number 2 also add Embassy of Denmark among the list of the agencies who sent comments on IP
o Under point 4.1, next steps point 3 instead of saying that “DANIDA as the supervising entity should prepare Afghanistan proposal for Catalytic Funding” it should say Ministry of Education with close collaboration of Demark Embassy should prepare the proposal. / HRDB Secretariat / Amend the minute and reflect the proposed changes
4. / Business Arising from the Minutes
4.1 / Update on Appraisal of Education Interim Plan—Denmark Embassy / · Mr. Jesper Andersen on behalf of the Donor Appraisal Team reported that the team has reviewed the Interim Plan and by end of the week report of the appraisal will be sent to Ministry of Education officially. He stated that what he can say at the moment is that the report has positive attitude about the Interim Plan but he will leave the rest to be made public once the report results are officially sent to MoE. So the team will meet the deadlines already developed.
· The purpose of the appraisal was not to go to details but rather to review and question the broader issues based on FTI guidelines.
Next Steps for Endorsement:
1. The appraisal team will send to MoE report of the appraisal along with a letter signed by all the four donor team.
2. MoE needs to send the IP along with the appraisal report to FTI secretariat. The FTI Secretariat will do an external quality assurance of the IP and inform Afghanistan about its outcomes. / The Donor Appraisal Team / · Send the official report of the Appraisal to MoE
4.2 / Update on MoLSAMD National Strategic Plan Progress—MoLSAMD / · Since MoLSAMD representative was not attending the meeting, Mr. Mirwais Masood reported that an outline of the national strategic plan was presented in the November meeting of the Employment Bridging and Support Taskforce.
· The plan is to start the work on the national strategic plan and finish it by end of March 2011. / MoLSAMD / To ensure that MoLSAMD attends the HRDB meetings regularly.
5. / New Business
5.1 / Evaluation of HRDB 2010 Performance & Lessons Learned and the Way Forward. / · Mr. Mirwais Masood presented the progress of the HRDB activities in 2010. He lighted that much of the HRDB focus in 2010 went on transformation of Education Development Board (EDB) to Human Resource Development Board and (HRDB) which resulted to integration of MoHE, MoWA and MoLSAMD into HRDB; establishment of a number of new working groups and taskforces such as Higher Education Working Group (in MoHE), Gender Mainstreaming Taskforce (in MoWA) and Employment Bridging and Support Taskforce (in MoLAMD).
· HRDB also focused on revision of NESP and Afghanistan Application to Fast Track Initiative (FTI) and development of the Education Interim Plan.
· Some major lessons learned from HRDB 2010 activities were also presented. Following captures some of the highlights:
o It was also highlighted that HRDB in 2010 could not focus a lot on policy and reform discussion, something that should be prioritized for 2011;
o There is need for more involvement and leadership support of the Chair and Co-Chair for some of the technical working groups and taskforces. (Attached please see the full presentation).
Comments provided by members:
USAID (Ms. Renu Jain):
· As highlighted in the presentation there is a need for more policy discussions. Maybe one way would be to have list of policy priorities for each group for 2011.
· The meetings require to be more focused and discuss some of the major challenges in the sector.
MoHE (Dr. Amiryar):
· Since establishment of the Higher Education Working Group MoHE has had good meetings with German, World Bank and USAID. Also they are planning to meet with Norway to see how they can support the higher education.
Norway (Mr. Anders Wirak):
· With the donor coordination experience from other countries it can be said that HRDB is a model that even other countries should learn from. It is really helpful for coordinating major policy issues and program implementation. Its consistency can help sustainability of institutionalization of donor and government initiatives.
(Teacher Education) Susan Wardak:
· The HRDB should make policy and reform issues as one of its top agenda. Maybe one way can be to ask each working group to make a list of 10 to 14 priority issues for 2011 and then from them to give to HRDB Steering Committee two-three of them as top priorities of the group to be included in HRDB monthly meeting agenda.
(HRDC) Dr. Weera:
· HRDB need to focus on policy and reform issues and different themes can be identified such as quality, access and relevance.
· Also HRDB should have policy chats with ministries to inform them on key policy reform issues.
· There is need to better use the technical expertise of our colleagues thus troublesome issues should be bought to attention of the board.
(HRDB) Dr. Wahidyar:
· The vision for the Steering Committee (SC) is to bring all the major human resource development partners around a table and coordinate the major policy issues. It is not the job of the SC to monitor the activities of each working group but to know where the development projects must go and where they are. The Board is here to listen to what the challenges we have and what are the solutions for them.
· There is a need to have one coordinator for each HRDB ministry who can give full time support to follow of HRDB issues in the relevant ministries and among the development partners. / HRDB Secretariat / Request Technical Working Groups to work on their policy and reform priority lists as well as their action plans for 2011.
5.2 / Proposed Model for Integration of HRDC with HRDB / The Human Resource Development Cluster (HRDC) was established in January 2010 to create a synergy among five government ministries (MoWA, MoE, MoHE, MoLSAMD and MoPH) for achieving job creation, economic growth, and improved service delivery. (Attached please see the full version of the document)
On the other hand HRDB has been working to focus on policy and reform discussions. Thus there are already a lot of synergies among the objectives of the two initiatives.
HRDB has a Chair from MoE and a Co-Chair from Development Partners. It is supported by two national TAs. HRDC on the other hand has a coordinator and a lead ministry supported by team of national and & international TAs.
Thus there are good rational for amalgamation of the two initiatives. The idea is to move with the integration gradually. The HRDB working groups/taskforces can be used to also include the cluster issues in their agenda.
Member’s Comments:
Denmark (Mr. Jesper Andersen):
There is need to be careful as NESP and IP have gone far and there is possibility of funding for them but some other ministries are behind. The process should not jeopardize the advances that have already been made.
The other question is what will happen to the health as it is part of the Cluster but HRDB only discusses the education sector.
CIDA (Mr. Chris Braeuel):
CIDA is also concerned about what will happen to the health as its joining can have different implications.
Germany (Mr. Rudiger Blumor)
Germany supports the sectorial integration and collaboration but given the extra coordination that it requires it suggests a step wise approach.
Higher Education (Mr. Fred Hayward)
Ministry of Higher Education supports the integration of HRDB and HRDC as it will remove a lot of duplications.
MoE (Dr. Wahidyar )
The main purpose of HRDB and HRDC is ultimately to help three things: education, higher education and training of Afghan children. Thus there are a lot of commonalties between objectives of HRDB and HRDC to amalgamate.
HRDC (Mr. Sediq Weera):
HRDB and HRDC are mutually not exclusive of each other. The integration is aiming at brining more efficiency. The integration requires to be implemented step by step and over a long period of time. / HRDC and HRDB / To work together on implementing the integration of HRDC and HRDB.
6. / Working Groups Reports
6.1 / Gender Mainstreaming Taskforce—MoWA / · The Taskforce has had two meetings so far. They have finalized ToR of the Taskforces and list of the members.
· In the meeting of 8 December they had invited the HRDC cluster to present their gender components but except Ministry of Public the rest of the ministries did not make any presentations / No Action
6.2 / Employment Support Taskforce—MoLSAMD / · One of the major issues for the meeting was to discuss the outline of the MoLSAMD strategic plan.
· Also the group finalized ToR of the taskforce.
· USAID presented its TVET national program which is still under design. / No Action
6.3 / Higher Education—MoHE / · Donor contribution to higher education is one of the major issues for higher education. Out of the $ 560.00 million proposed budget in the Higher Education National Strategic Plan for five years so far MoHE only has a commitment for $ 67.00 million. Another $ 222.00 million request has been made to Kabul Conference but for the remaining gap there is no donor commitment.
· The group requests the major donors to participate in the meetings of Higher Education / Donors / There is need for donors to engage in higher education more actively and explore their support for higher education.
6.4 / Tec Voc— UNAMA / · The group has agreed on a three month rotating chair. MoLAMD is the Chair for the initial three months and MoE will take on in the second round.
· Revision of ToR of the group and selection of the Co-Chair of the Group were other issues that were discussed in November meeting.
· MoLSAMD and ILO updated the group that proposal of the market national survey is ready and they need donor contribution. / Chair / Ensure that the group representative attends the HRDB Steering Committee meeting.
6.5 / Teacher Education— TED and WB / · The group has identified and discussed 14 priorities that the group will focus in 2011.
· Accelerate Learning Program is another priority of the group. Around 23000 teachers have been registered so far.
· The Learning Outcome Study is another focus of the group. In this study 2300 students and 400 teachers have participated and soon its report will be out.
· This year 90,000 teachers with 14 and 12 grade qualifications went through the reform process. 20000 of them are women and 5000 of them are master trainers / No Action
6.6 / General Education-MoE / · Mr. Gul Wahidi from MoE presented concept of special education that he has developed. The concept looks at three major disabilities, hearing impairment, visual impairment and mental impairment. It is proposing establishment of a national and seven regional institutions that should training teachers in the mentioned areas.
· The concept requires donor support for this initiatives (Attached please find the full version of the concept) / Mr. Gul Wahidi / Share the concept with HRDB Secretariat so that it is shared with all HRDB members.
6.7 / LIFE Group- UNESCO / · The group had meeting of the provincial coordinators and the plan is to increase 10000 literacy centers in 100 districts of 18 provinces through the Functional Literacy Program. / UNESCO / Share website of LIFE with HRDB members
6.8 / Education Management Group- MoE / · The group has been focusing on reforming the MoE monitoring and reporting systems. A new format for data collection from district and province have been developed.
· The Planning Directorate is working on developing operational plans for the interim plan which will focus at district and province level. / No Action
7 / AOB / · Mr. Jesper Andersen briefed the team that the Fast Track Initiative has asked for data collection on progress of education in the country to establish some baselines. The purpose of this exercise is to improve aid effectiveness in the education sector.
· It is a two step process:
o To collect data on education which is already available.
o To elaborate on the data.
A request through Demark Embassy was sent to all HRDB members asking for a volunteer agency to take this assignment but so far no response has been received. / All HRDB members / Any agency interested in this exercise should contact Denmark Embassy.
Next Meeting: Monday 17 January
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