Country Portfolio Study (CPS) El Salvador

El Salvador began receiving GEF support in 1994 with investments around $11.4 million and $22.7 million in co-financing (data as of end of 2010). Eleven national projects have been funded by the GEF that include six projects in biodiversity, three in climate change, one in POPs, and one multifocal project. Biodiversity was 82 percent of total support while climate change was 12 percent. In addition, El Salvador has participated in 20 initiatives financially supported by the GEF with a regional or global scope.

The El Salvador Country Portfolio Study was conducted by the GEF Evaluation Office in collaboration with the United Nations Development Programme from October 2010 to April 2011. The study was presented to the GEF Council in May 2011 as a part of the Annual Country Portfolio Evaluation Report (ACPER 2011).

Conclusions

• The GEF has played an important role in supporting El Salvador in complying with its obligations under the relevant global conventions and in the generation of national strategies, but its contributions has been smaller in strengthening the country's legal framework.
• The GEF has made a significant contribution toward capacity building in environmental management within the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources. These capacities have been created around compilation and systematizing environmental information for decision-making, application of established methodologies, and the design of guidelines and tools.
• The global benefits achieved by GEF projects remain modest and uncertain due to projects being in an early stage of execution; in the case of the completed projects, the information necessary for verifying the scope of the benefits is not available. Below there is information about some results achieved by the GEF-supported projects.

In biodiversity, GEF support has helped ongoing efforts by the national environmental authority in land planning, integrated ecosystem management, and biodiversity conservation.

In international waters, achievement of global environmental benefits resulted specifically from the completed regional project on sustainable alternatives to DDT for malaria vector control.

Climate change mitigation has gained importance in the last few years in the country. Less progress has been made in the area of adaptation to climate change.

The sustainability and scale-up of the results achieved has yet to occur. The country lacks the resources to scale up these initial benefits, and synergies with other international development partners active in the environmental sector have not yet been sufficiently pursued.