Public-private partnerships in developing countries : a systemic literature review

Public-private partnerships (PPP’s) are a relatively recent phenomenon in international development cooperation. Current policy documents frequently refer to expectations regarding their potential contributions to global development goals. The growing international attention was firmly backed by the Netherlands government. However, there are still few diagnostic tools available to determine when and how PPP’s represent a preferred institutional arrangement. Moreover, the empirical evidence on the effectiveness and efficiency of PPP’s is notably scarce. This IOB study provides insights in the variety of PPP arrangements. A major conclusion derived from this review is that PPP evaluations focus on resource sharing but pay little attention to the risk-sharing and revenue distribution dimension of partnerships. This study was commissioned by the Policy and Operations Evaluation Department (IOB) of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.