PHRD

The Japan Policy and Human Resources Development Fund (PHRD) Fund was established in 1990 as a partnership between the Government of Japan and the World Bank. The scope of the Fund is described in the Arrangement for the Administration of Fund (as revised in March 1999) as follows:

“The Fund may be used for the purposes of financing technical assistance and other grant activities in respect of the formulation and implementation of Bank-supported projects and programs and activities to develop human resources in developing member countries of the Bank, to assist developing member countries of the Bank to formulate and implement development policy and to strengthen the partnership between the Government of Japan and the Bank.”

Since fiscal year 2000 the Government of Japan has contributed over US$617 million to the Fund. It is one of the largest Funds managed by the World Bank and is recognized as making a unique contribution to the member countries’ capacity building efforts.

The PHRD Fund supports five main programs:   

v The PHRD Technical Assistance (TA) Program is the largest program, and provides grants primarily to assist the Bank’s member countries to prepare and implement Bank-supported operations financed by IBRD loans and IDA credits and grants. In addition, this program supports a range of climate change related programs. In FY06, aid coordination enhancement activities have been included for funding under this program.

v The Joint-Japan/World Bank Graduate Scholarship Program (JJ/WBGSP) provides scholarships to support post graduate training at Masters’ degree level for Bank’s member country nationals. This is both the longest established and the largest of the scholarship programs managed by the Bank.

v The PHRD-World Bank Institute (WBI) Capacity Development Program supports WBI’s capacity development activities with particular focus on activities in East, South and Central Asia.

v The Japan Staff and Extended Term Consultants (ETC) Program supports partial costs of Japanese nationals recruited to work within the Bank for maximum periods of two years.

v The Japan-World Bank Partnership Program supports activities to promote partnership between Japan and the World Bank.

In addition, transfers are occasionally made from the PHRD Fund to provide Japanese support to other World Bank-administered programs, such as HIPC, CEPF, CGAP, Cities Alliance, CTFand PPIAF.