The Project to Support Democratic Development through Decentralisation and Deconcentration (PSDD) is designed to assist RGC to meet these D&D reform challenges. In so doing it will help RGC maintain the delicate balance between continuity and change, while continuing to strengthen service delivery and access in poor rural areas. The underlying principle of the PSDD is to support a government-led reform process. It is designed to be flexible and to respond to RGC’s D&D reform programme as it evolves. Key milestones, such as passage of the organic law on D&D and formulation of the national programme, will trigger an appraisal of the PSDD and, where appropriate, adjustment of the programme so that it is in line with, and does not pre-empt, RGC policy.
The goal of the PSDD is to reduce poverty in Cambodia through support to D&D reform. The specific purpose of PSDD is to improve governance, service delivery and development for the rural poor. Progress will be realized by a focus on three objectives:
Objective 1: strengthening local government systems and structures to enable better pro-poor investments;
Objective 2: improving the quality, accessibility and equity of services at the subnational level; and
Objective 3: prior to and following enactment of the organic law on D&D, supporting a more effective policy, legal, political, institutional and administrative framework that will give the poor greater access to and benefits from local services.
The project is jointly funded by Sida, DFID and UNDP. Approximately US$34.8 million will be provided over a three-year period (2007-2009). In the interim period before the establishment of the RGC D&D Fund, PSDD resources will be managed under a Basket Fund.
