Country Strategy

Together, IDB staff and Guatemala determine how Guatemala's priorities coincide with the Bank’s development strategies for the region. The product of that process is the IDB country strategy with Guatemala, containing the Bank’s expected program for Guatemala for 2008-2011.

Country strategies include an overview of a country’s current economic situation. They draw on analytical work conducted by the Bank and other parties on a wide range of economic and social sectors, such as rural and urban development, health, education, government modernization, transportation, trade, and the environment, among others.

Guatemala’s Operational Strategy (2008-2011)

The Bank’s country strategy with Guatemala parallels the new 2004-2007 political cycle in the country, which began when President Oscar Berger took office after the elections at the end of 2003, which also included congressional and municipal elections.

Guatemala’s main development challenges are:

The 2008-2011 Bank strategy with Guatemala is synchronous with the term of the current Guatemalan administration, which took office on 14 January 2008. The Strategy is the product of dialogue with the current administration and outlines the agreements reached on the main guiding objectives for the Bank’s engagement and contribution over the life of the Strategy. A salient feature of the fruits of this enriching process is that the Strategy is strongly results-driven, since both the Guatemalan government and the IDB wish the institution’s work to be anchored in a defined set of the country’s priority development goals, to which the IDB can make a significant contribution given its experience and financial resources.

Over the life of the Strategy the IDB will focus its support on the following Guatemalan government agenda goals:

• Reduce chronic malnutrition
• Reduce the intergenerational transmission of poverty
• Upgrade and maintain production infrastructure
• Achieve the revenue collection targets established in the Peace Accords.

To fulfill those goals the IDB will support Guatemalan government policies to enhance human capital development of the country’s poorest children, placing particular emphasis on chronic malnutrition (especially in children under 3 and pregnant women) and on low school achievement in priority municipios.