Sector-wide Evaluations

Health is a fundamental human right and a cornerstone of sustainable and inclusive development. As the 2030 deadline for Sustainable Development Goal approaches, countries in Asia and the Pacific have made significant strides—lowering child mortality, improving maternal health, and expanding access to care. Despite these gains, challenges persist as aging populations, rising noncommunicable diseases, and unequal access continue to strain health systems, especially in the wake of COVID-19.

Countries in Asia and the Pacific have made significant progress in expanding access to education. However, challenges remain in ensuring equitable access, improving learning outcomes, and aligning education with labor market demands. As a result, many economies face both graduate surpluses and skills shortages. These problems were exacerbated by the COVID-19 pandemic.

This evaluation assessed the relevance and effectiveness of ADB’s finance sector operations during 2011–2021. It evaluated the relevance of ADB's 2011 Finance Sector Operational Plan vis-à-vis evolving financial markets and ADB’s Strategy 2030. The evaluation considered the extent to which ADB’s finance sector operations strengthened the foundation for financial sector development, expanded inclusive finance, developed capital markets and contractual savings for financing infrastructure, strengthened financial stability and integrity, and enhanced regional cooperation and integration to promote cross-border capital flows.

The Independent Evaluation Department’s evaluation of the water sector takes stock of ADB’s engagement in the water sector during the last decade to identify lessons and propose directions for its future engagement in the sector for strengthening water security and reducing risks. The evaluation team assessed the performance and results of ADB’s support to the sector. It consulted DMC officials and stakeholders and interviewed technical and professional staff within and outside ADB. Given the water sector’s vast scope and the varying results corresponding to different institutional contexts in DMCs, the report puts forward only the main findings and recommendations.

Economies benefit from abundant access to energy that is efficient, secure, equitable, and environmentally and financially sustainable. Much progress has been made in improving access to electricity in the Asia and Pacific region. Even so, energy reliability and sustainability need to improve. While total energy supply and demand in the region has more than doubled since 2000, the primary energy mix has not changed significantly and is still heavily reliant on coal and crude oil, affecting the long-run sustainability of energy systems. Electricity and heat generation is responsible for over 30% of total emissions, making the sector highly intertwined with efforts to address climate change, particularly by enhancing mitigation efforts through the energy sector.

Transport systems provide arteries for efficient movement of people and goods in a well-functioning economy. The Asia and Pacific region has witnessed brisk economic growth and social development leading to increased mobility and urbanization. Rapid growth and urbanization creates pressure on transport system and services, which need to keep up not only to sustain the economic growth, but also to ensure much needed equitable access and quality services for all sections of the society. To meet the increasing demand, ADB estimates the costs of transport infrastructure requirements in the Asia Pacific region to be more than 500ドル billion a year. Financing such large amounts cannot be done with public funds alone and will require active participation from the private sector.

The Asia and the Pacific region is transitioning from largely agrarian and rural economies to increasingly nonagricultural and urban economies, and from subsistence to commercial agriculture. However, because Asia is home to most of the world’s hungry and most of the poor still live in rural areas and are engaged with agriculture and related activities for their livelihoods, agriculture and rural development remains a cornerstone as countries make this transition.