Aid effectiveness has emerged as an intensely debated issue amongst policy makers, donors, development practitioners, civil society and academics during the past decade. This debate revolves around one important question: does official development assistance complement, duplicate or disregard the local resource endowment in offering support to recipient economies?

This book draws on Pakistan’s experience in responding to this question with a diverse range of examples. It focuses on a central idea: no aid effectiveness without an effective receiving mechanism. Pakistan is among the top aid recipient countries in the developing economies. It was a shining model in the sixties and it ranks among the highly underperforming countries after the new millennium. This book offers an insight into the dynamics of success and failure of Pakistan in availing foreign financial and technical assistance for human development and poverty alleviation. It draws on field experiences to present case studies on water, shelter, health, education, and health and safety at work to identify the causes and consequences of aid in relation to social reality. Findings relate to developing economies and would be of interest to a wide range of individuals within the development sector.

Fayyaz Baqir is a Development Practitioner. At present he is a visiting professor at University of Ottawa. During the past 3 decades he has been engaged in managing grant programmes for supporting Local Agenda 21. He has advised, researched, taught and written on innovative practices for achieving global development goals through local action. Special focus of his work has been on poverty alleviation, participatory development and social entrepreneurship.

As part of his work he has worked as Programme Monitoring Officer of Aga Khan Rural Support Programme (AKRSP), National Coordinator of UNDP’s small grants programme, Chief Executive Officer of Trust for Voluntary Organizations (TVO), Senior Civil Society Advisor of UN system in Pakistan and served on the Board of Advisors of Ministry of Environment and the Committee for Social Safety Network Policy review of the Government of Pakistan.

He has researched, taught and lectured on innovative participatory development practices at Georgetown University, Harvard University, McGill University, Gothenburg University, Tilburg University, Wellesley College, Pacific University, University of Idaho, Punjab University, National Defence University and Fatima Jinnah Women University.

He serves on the Boards of numerous NGOs in Pakistan and led the process for developing country strategies for Plan International, Water Aid, World Vision and Rural Development Policy Institute in Pakistan. He received award for setting up the most vibrant small grants programme in Pakistan and knowledge sharing award from UNDP’s poverty alleviation practice network for 2 consecutive years.