The Millennium Challenge Account (MCA)–Philippines will soon use the unifying Project Management and Monitoring and Evaluation System (PROMMES) as its primary tool for performance monitoring, analysis and reporting.
PROMMES will assist the MCA Philippines in effectively managing the five-year $434 million Compact approved by the Millennium Challenge Corporation and the Government of Philippines in 2011. The compact includes programs supporting policy reforms, boosting infrastructure development, expanding community-driven development projects, and investing in capacity building and institutional strengthening.
More transparent and effective management of such development programs is a major priority in the Philippines. In the 2011-2016 Philippine Development Plan, President Benigno S. Aquino III states: “The Philippine record of socioeconomic development has been slow and below par in comparison with our Asian counterparts. Despite episodes of positive growth, the benefits have yet to be felt by the majority of Filipinos.” He describes “good governance and anticorruption as the overarching theme of each and every intervention.”
Synergy International Systems has been developing PROMMES to support MCA-Philippines in making evidence-based decisions with rapidly retrievable and insightful data, and ensuring the impact-driven use of MCC investments. The system will be used by all stakeholders including, MCA-Philippines management and Board of Directors, implementing partners, and Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC).
Prior to the PROMMES initiative, MCA-Philippines relied on a basic Document Management Systems (DMS). But the evolving number of large, cross-cutting projects carried out by various agencies—and the ensuing proliferation of data—spawned a vital need to establish an all-encompassing system that would provide a comprehensive and real-time analytical picture of the Compact performance and results.
“MCA-Philippines is excited about PROMMES’ impact on making our work more effective,” said MCA-Philippines MIS Director, Ms. Claricel Yuvienco. “We are enthusiastic about working with Synergy International Systems on this information system given their expertise in delivering similar systems for other MCA Compacts in Lesotho, Mozambique, and Tanzania.”
According to Dr. David Kocharov, Synergy’s Director of Monitoring & Evaluation, “The MCA-Philippines staff is very diligent, detail-oriented, and constructive in their work attitude.”
