Off on Vacation!

Monday, I picked up my visa at the Belarusian consulate here on Str. Bucarest in Chisinau, and yesterday, I bought my train ticket to Lviv where I will meet Jonas on Friday. He will already have been on the road for a few days, driving down from Sweden. For the next two weeks, we will go around northern Romania, Moldova, stay a few days at the beach in Odessa, and continuing to Kyiv, Minsk, Vilnius, and then take the ferry to Stockholm from Riga on August 11. Except for Moldova, Odessa and Kyiv, these are all new places for me and I am super excited! I will try to keep you updated along the way, at least with shorter blog postings over the cell-phone.

Moldova’s Way for the Future

If anyone is wondering which way Moldova will take for its future in the choice between East and West (a choice that still unfortunately has to be made), there are a few signs around Chisinau:

The EU-flag  next to Moldova’s flag and as a plantation

in the City (Puskin) Park.

The NATO Information Center by the State University

in Chisinau

^

"EU and Moldova together for Education" – about the

hundreds of million € that the EU supporting Moldova’s

education system with. (From outside the State University.)

It should however be noted that President Voronin has declared Moldova being neutral and ensured that Moldova will not join NATO.

My Work at the Bank

I realized a while ago that many of you – my family and friends – do not really know what I work with here at the World Bank Country Office in Chisinau. There is alway so much else to talk about when we meet, so I thought I would give you an insight in my work program and what a normal workday for me looks like here on the blog instead, especially since I only have a few more months left here.

My work program now is quite different from the one described when I applied for this job more than two years ago. The first Terms of Reference that I got at first was quite vague and so I asked my boss if I could continue to work partly on agriculture, to build on my experience from FAO, which he thought was a good idea. Since, other things have also landed on my desk for different reasons, and so my work program is now quite broad but also very interesting.

Thus, my work here is basically divided according to the following:

50%: Agriculture and rural development, and agricultural policies;

25%: Governance and anti-corruption;

10%: Migration;

15%: Issues related to the responsibility of the Management Unit.

It might seem a bit scattered in terms of topics, and in a way it is. But governance and anti-corruption as well as migration are interesting to get some insight in because from the Bank’s perspective, these topics are cross-sectoral. And just like for example a gender perspective and an environmental perspective should be taken into account in all sector work, so should governance and anti-corruption, and if applicable, migration. So it has been both interesting and useful to work with these issues.

These past two years, my work has in part involved pure analytical work, i.e. analyzing data, writing chapters for studies and reports, back-ground papers for the Bank’s up-coming country strategy, etc. This part of my work has also included commenting on Government policies (the ones that they ask us to comment on of course), and sometimes on reports, strategies and proposed projects of other donors. Another part of my work has been to monitor the implementation of a number of policies in the agricultural sector, which the government has committed to. In the area of governance and anti-corruption, I have mainly been involved in enhancing the Bank’s governance and anti-corruption program here in Moldova according to its global governance and anti-corruption strategy of 2007. Until now, I have not been involved so much in project preparation and project implementation (only at some very early stage in the project cycle), but hopefully, I will do more of that in the future.

On a day-to-day basis, my schedule very much depends on if I have a team here from DC or our regional office in Kyiv, or not. If I do not have a visiting team here, I normally spend a lot of time in my office, doing analytical work and following up on things via e-mail. I also meet with my counterparts in the Government on a regular basis, as well as with donors and with relevant civil society organizations, both in larger meetings and more informally. In all the areas that I work, I have arranged a number of consultations and roundtable discussions, which is always interesting. 

If I have visiting teams here, the schedule is more intense and we normally have meetings all day, with Government, civil society, private sector, and donors, depending on the purpose of the visit. When I have agricultural teams here, we go out in the rural areas a lot, which is one of the best parts with my job. We meet farmers and hear directly from them what in their view are the main concerns and obstacles for agricultural development. We then meet with Government representatives and Government officials and discuss the feedback from the farmers, as well as statistics and results of different policies.

Does it sound boring? It isn’t! 

Me in my office (and yes, it is normally more disorganized!)

The Park with the Lake without the Lake

In the middle of central Chisinau, there is a very nice park. Beautiful stairs from several directions all lead down through the park to a grand lake in the middle. Or at least there used to be a park there. Surrounded by a boardwalk and other paths, with outdoor restaurants on the shore, and with rowing boats to rent, the lake was the main feature of the park, the heart around which everything circulated. And the park provided a lovely escape from the urban dust in Chisinau.

In 2006, after the fish in the lake started to die in masses, the Chisinau municipal authority concluded that the lake was so polluted that there was no other option than to drain it, clean it and refill it with new water. This was less of an irrational decision than it might sound, since the lake was artificially constructed. (My colleague told me that his grandfather was ordered in from the village to take part in the work on the lake in the 1950s. Since his grandfather had a bit of property and some animals, he was never paid for the work – other than having had the honor of contributing to the construction of this lake.) When I first came to Chisinau, the park, which’s real name is Valea Morilor after the lake itself, was commonly referred to as “The Park with the Lake”. Last year, there was just a big mud hole in the middle of the park, which we now called “The Park With the Lake Without Water”.

The intention of the Chisinau authority was of course to refill the lake. But the work was initiated without official tenders having been made according to public procurement procedures. So the work was stopped, awaiting proper tenders to be announced. However, financial resources were never assigned the project. After the municipal election in 2007, when an opposition party to that of the Central Government gained power, the allocation of state resources to the capital was basically cut, and so was the hope to finance the restoration of the lake.

This year, the middle of the park is filled with vegetation (nature has an impressive capacity to recover), and rumors has it that poor Chisinauians grow vegetables there, but I have not investigated it further. Clear is however that the park has lost some of its charm without the lake in the middle. We now call it “The Park with the Lake without the Lake”, or simply “The Park without the Lake”.

Beautiful stairs lead down to the park…

…with nice plantations at the foot of the steps…

…and a bicycle lane and a boardwalk surrounding…

…the lake!

The boardwalk with its benches looks a bit

depressing at the edge of the field!

Please note that the information above is just based on stories that I have been told, and that I have not confirmed this with any of the authorities mentioned.

Counting Down

I was just copied on a reminder from the Human Resource Department to my boss that my contract is expiring in 90 days. Only 90 days left here in Moldova!! Can’t believe that time has passed so quickly. It seems like it was only yesterday that I arrived here the first time.

So what will I do next? Well, I have a pretty clear idea, but it is not 100% sure yet, so I don’t want to write about it here. But if everything goes as planned, I have a lot of interesting things to look forward to in 90 days. However, it is a bit sad to think that I will only be here in Chisinau for three more months. I will try to make the most out of it, and hopefully, I will be able to come back regularly. Because even if I am looking forward to new and exciting experiences, I will for sure miss this lovely little country and all my friends here.

               Moldova Forever  

(Apart from the contract, the e-mail also reminded me that my mandatory retirement is on April 30, 2036. It is a bit weird to think about!)