Project activity completion report for rural roads maintenance and rehabilitation II, AID project number 517-0177

The project was successful in several areas. It expanded the DGCV's institutional capacity by enlarging its existing supervision, sociology, and cost estimating units, establishing a regional center for rural roads maintenance, and creating a new unit to assist PVO's in implementing P.L.480 activities involving the construction of trails for pack animals. In coordination with private contractors and PVO's, the DGCV rehabilitated 786 km of the planned 962 km of rural roads and constructed 150 km of pack animal trails. It employed 10,000 subsistence-level farmers on a short-term basis to rehabilitate roads in their areas, thus developing skills and fostering a greater sense of community responsibility for rural roads. Improvements in the roads system in turn increased the efficiency of agricultural transports from farms to markets. The project also provided TA for mapping rural roads, researching the use of local materials to surface and stabilize roads, and training personnel to operate, maintain, and inventory the heavy equipment procured with project funds. telecommunications system for the DGCV, and constructed 12 "mini-mercado" shelters to protect agricultural products at points where several trails converge on a rural road. In the long-term, there is cause for concern about the Government of the Dominican Republic's commitment to rural roads rehabilitation and maintenance. This is evident in that the various road-building agencies still lack uniform standards for constructing, maintaining, and rehabilitating roads. project required a number of commitments from the GODR which at times were not forthcoming. For example, when the President began a national campaign to erect monuments and large public works, cement and equipment were diverted away from rural roads maintenance. There were also problems of commitment within SEOPC (DGCV's parent agency), which had six Administrators within the 7 years of the project -- one of whom fired en masse 712 village- level maintenance workers. All were eventually reinstated, but the incident shows the difficulties encountered in dealing with institutions that view such jobs as patronage positions.