Support to Tertiary Education Project (WB-P175694)

Countries
  • Iraq
Geographic location where the impacts of the investment may be experienced.
Financial Institutions
  • World Bank (WB)
International, regional and national development finance institutions. Many of these banks have a public interest mission, such as poverty reduction.
Project Status
Approved
Stage of the project cycle. Stages vary by development bank and can include: pending, approval, implementation, and closed or completed.
Bank Risk Rating
U
Environmental and social categorization assessed by the development bank as a measure of the planned project’s environmental and social impacts. A higher risk rating may require more due diligence to limit or avoid harm to people and the environment. For example, "A" or "B" are risk categories where "A" represents the highest amount of risk. Results will include projects that specifically recorded a rating, all other projects are marked ‘U’ for "Undisclosed."
Voting Date
Feb 16, 2022
Date when project documentation and funding is reviewed by the Board for consideration and approval. Some development banks will state a "board date" or "decision date." When funding approval is obtained, the legal documents are accepted and signed, the implementation phase begins.
Borrower
Government of Iraq
A public entity (government or state-owned) provided with funds or financial support to manage and/or implement a project.
Sectors
  • Education and Health
  • Law and Government
The service or industry focus of the investment. A project can have several sectors.
Investment Type(s)
Advisory Services
The categories of the bank investment: loan, grant, guarantee, technical assistance, advisory services, equity and fund.
Project Cost (USD)
$ 5.00 million
Value listed on project documents at time of disclosure. If necessary, this amount is converted to USD ($) on the date of disclosure. Please review updated project documents for more information.
Bank Documents
Primary Source

Original disclosure @ WB website

Updated in EWS Jun 14, 2022

Disclosed by Bank Sep 22, 2021

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Project Description
If provided by the financial institution, the Early Warning System Team writes a short summary describing the purported development objective of the project and project components. Review the complete project documentation for a detailed description.

According to bank documents, the project objective is to develop institutional capacity for improving employability of university students in national development priority areas.

  1. Component 1: Developing institutional capacity in disciplinary areas that support the national development priority sectors (proposed allocation US$3.0m). Among the reasons for skill-mismatches in the labor market which have led to high unemployment rate of tertiary education graduates in Iraq is that programs and training offered at TEIs are less relevant and of poor quality. While the labor market is saturated with graduates from traditional, long-established programs (e.g., humanities specialization), graduates with skills from disciplinary areas that can serve the needs of national development priority sectors are difficult to find. Learning from international experiences (e.g., Africa Centers of Excellence) and after having consulted the Ministry of Planning and other relevant ministries, MoHESR plans to address the issue by piloting the center of excellence (CoE) concept in three national development priority areas – agriculture, health and renewable energy. The proposed project therefore will support MoHESR’s effort in establishing a CoE in each of these three priority areas. Although the Project will not be able to finance fully the establishment of these CoEs due to its very limited funding, it will focus more on some critical aspects of CoE (see below) with the introduction and application of international good practices, supporting MoHESR and these centers to build a solid foundation which will enable them to mobilize additional resources for further development.

  2. Component 2: Strengthening institutional capacity and partnerships with the private sector and international institutions to improve graduates’ employability (proposed allocation US$1.5m). Besides the less-diversified economy and limited job opportunities, many tertiary education graduates have difficulty finding a job due to that fact their skills do not match what employers are looking for. Addressing this issue requires efforts being made at both the institutional and the individual levels, but none of them can yield a satisfactory outcome without engaging the private sector and learning from good practices elsewhere. The proposed project plans to support MoHESR in developing an incentive mechanism through competitive fund to foster partnerships between TEIs and the private sector and international institutions, equipping students with 21st century skills and market-relevant skills such as digital skills for future jobs. It is also expected that institutional capacity will be further strengthened through piloting competitive fund (see below) and that the sense of social responsibility among business communities can be improved through their established partnerships with TEIs.

Investment Description
Here you can find a list of individual development financial institutions that finance the project.

Contact Information
This section aims to support the local communities and local CSO to get to know which stakeholders are involved in a project with their roles and responsibilities. If available, there may be a complaint office for the respective bank which operates independently to receive and determine violations in policy and practice. Independent Accountability Mechanisms receive and respond to complaints. Most Independent Accountability Mechanisms offer two functions for addressing complaints: dispute resolution and compliance review.

World Bank:
Contact : Xiaonan Cao Title : Senior Education Specialist
Telephone No : 473-8917

Borrower:
Borrower : Ministry of Finance
Contact : Salah Hadeethi Title : Minister Advisor
Telephone No : 9647901915000 Email : hadeethi.saladin@gmail.com 

Implementing Agencies:
Ministry of Higher Education and Scientific Research
Contact : Ehab Abbas Title : Director General of Studies, Planning, and Follow-up
Telephone No : 9647901915250 Email : ehab19722002@gmail.com 

ACCESS TO INFORMATION

To submit an information request for project information, you will have to create an account to access the Access to Information request form. You can learn more about this process at: https://www.worldbank.org/en/access-to-information/request-submission 

ACCOUNTABILITY MECHANISM OF THE WORLD BANK

The World Bank Inspection Panel is the independent complaint mechanism and fact-finding body for people who believe they are likely to be, or have been, adversely affected by a World Bank-financed project. If you submit a complaint to the Inspection Panel, they may investigate to assess whether the World Bank is following its own policies and procedures for preventing harm to people or the environment. You can contact the Inspection Panel or submit a complaint by emailing ipanel@worldbank.org. Information on how to file a complaint and a complaint request form are available at: https://www.inspectionpanel.org/how-to-file-complaint 

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How it works