Improving Transport Project Appraisals
In the Islamic Countries
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2.3.2 Governance
In “ Transport Project Appraisals at the World Bank” it is stated that project appraisals perform a
rather different role in organisations such as WB than it does in a national administration. In
national administrations, project appraisals might be concerned with ranking the projects and
thus enabling prioritization of projects, whereas within the WB it fulfils the purpose of
establishing that individual investments represent sensible use of resources within the context
of the national economies to which they are devoted.
According to the WB ‘Handbook on Economic Analysis of Investment Operations’, decision-
makers are unable to conclude whether either the public or private sectors is the appropriate
provider of transport goods and services. This is because transport-infrastructure projects are
subject to economic-, as well as political considerations.
What, then, is the economic justification for public provision of goods and services? The answer
depends partially on whether a country’s welfare is likely to increase more if the public rather
than the private sector is the provider. In addition to economic considerations, there are also
equity, political and strategic considerations. Consequently, there are no hard and fast rules that
enable decision makers to come unmistakably to the conclusion that one or the other sector is
the appropriate provider.
An example of formal review process is provided by the major project appraisals, as embodied
in the EU cohesion policy legislation for 2014-2020. The appraisal procedure can take two
different forms and it is up to the project promoter in the Member State to decide which of the
two forms to apply31. The first option is an assessment of the major project by independent
experts followed by a notification to the Commission. According to this procedure, the
independent experts will assess the information provided on the major project according to
Article 101. The second option is to send the major project documentation directly to the
Commission, which will provide an internal assessment. As mentioned above, while this
independent quality review was previously performed internally with the support, when
necessary, of external consultants, in the current programming period this activity has been
recently entitled to a dedicated unit of the JASPERS initiative. Regardless the procedure adopted,
the aim is to check that: 1) the project dossier is complete, i.e. all the necessary information
required by the regulation is made available and is of sufficient quality; 2) the CBA analysis is of
good quality, i.e. it is coherent with the recommended methodology; and 3) the results of the
CBA analysis justify the contribution of the Funds.
2.3.3 Capacity and tools
The JASPERS initiative promoted by the EC is a partnership with the European Bank for
Investment with the purpose to provide technical assistance to the Member States' and
accessing countries in managing the EU funds and in the preparation and implementation of
31 Article 102 of Regulation (EU) No 1303/2013.