Sustainability plans need to outline funding requirements and proposed funding sources. MCC has historically tried to encourage partner countries to plan for post-compact operations and maintenance (O&M) by conditioning funding requests on some kind of O&M plan. However, MCC has little control over what happens post-compact and cannot predict things like the economic downturn experienced by Namibia. The RSRCs have some means for revenue generation though it is not enough to cover all of their costs or offset the reduction in budget resulting from Namibia’s economic downturn. Currently, RSRC revenue is managed by the Namibia Library and Information Council but it takes time to gain access to those funds, and sometimes requests are denied. The process of sustainability planning may have helped clarify protocols for managing the revenue generated by the RSRCs and ensuring RSRCs did not have resources just beyond their reach while their staff are making purchases using their own personal money for things like soap. MCC programs should support the government in developing a model to fund expected costs sustainably, including possibly conditioning compact funding on the establishment of a fund that will cover maintenance costs post-compact. However, while this planning is necessary, as mentioned above, building robust infrastructure that minimizes the lifecycle costs will reduce the financial demands of sustainability planning overall and may be one of the most promising solutions available.
Lesson Learned