Strengths, Weakness, Opportunities and Threats (SWOT) analysis of the Jharkhand Government proposal for the Jharkhand Sustainable Urban Development Project (JSUDP) seeking World Bank assistance of USD 210 million with a State Government funding commitment of USD 90 million was highlighted in the meeting conducted at New Delhi on Saturday.
The proposed project is well aligned with the new national urban agenda of the country as outlined through various national urban missions of the Government of India schemes such as AMRUT, Swacch Bharat Mission and the Smart Cities Mission.
“A major focus of the proposed assistance from the World Bank is to strengthen and enable the state’s urban institutions in implementing the national missions in a time-bound and successful manner by leveraging the technical expertise and the loan funds from the World Bank,” said Principal Secretary of Urban Development department, Arun Kumar Singh.
The proposed project includes all the key elements proposed under AMRUT and other national urban missions such as focus on in-built O&M component in the urban infrastructure projects, deploying regional as well as decentralized service delivery mechanisms for project implementation.
The proposed project is targeted at integrated and inclusive urban development of all eligible Urban local Bodies (UlB) of the state. This includes urban infrastructure development as well as implementation of urban reforms, improvement in urban governance and management, capacity building and institutional strengthening of entities such as Jharkhand Urban Infrastructure Development Company (JUIDCO) and the Jharkhand Urban Planning and Management Institute (JUPMI) which will establish a strong institutional framework for urban planning, infrastructure financing and development in the state.
“Given the backlog in investments, the requirements of urban infrastructure in the state are substantial. Since the amount of funding from the World Bank is limited to USD 210 million, the proposed project will be able to address a sub-set of infrastructure sub-projects across the state,” added Singh.
The proposed project will focus on a sub-set of urban reforms. While this will provide the required focus and intense efforts required for roll out and mainstreaming of the selected reforms, due to time and resource constraints, some of the important advanced urban reforms may require continued attention beyond one project period.
“Jharkhand will be able to learn from experiences of World Bank supported by urban projects in other Indian states as well as from other developing countries,” Singh further added.
The World Bank supported projects in the States of Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana and Madhya Pradesh. Certain constraints like getting to know the World Bank and delay in implementation of national urban missions including delays in disbursements from the national missions may impact the implementation pace of sub-projects.