Now in its second year of implementation, the Regional Afghan Municipalities Program for Urban Populations (RAMP UP) continues to work toward creating better local governance in Afghanistan. RAMP UP was designed to build local government capacity, improve service delivery, and strengthen economic development in selected municipalities. RAMP UP seeks to create a more responsive, democratic, and reliable government that gains the confidence of its citizens.

In collaboration with DAI, the prime contractor, and the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), ICMA seeks to promote more consistent and productive interactions between Afghan residents and their local governments in the western, northern, and eastern regions of the country, totaling twenty-seven provinces. RAMP UP uses on-the-job mentoring, training, advising, and technical assistance to achieve these goals.

RAMP UP is divided into four regions, and ICMA is involved in three: the East, the North, and the West. Each program began with one base year and has the opportunity to attain two additional performance-based option years. During the first year of the program, ICMA established offices, trained staff members, and developed relationships with the selected cities participating in RAMP UP. These established relationships are vital to the development of the program, because it is necessary for Afghanistan citizens to understand and acknowledge RAMP UP’s objectives. RAMP UP is designed to allow local citizens to take ownership of these programs and operate independently without foreign assistance in the future.

RAMP UP East: Business Licensing and Gender Mainstreaming

One highlight for RAMP UP East has been the implementation of the Business Registration and Licensing System, which replaces a previous archaic manual record keeping system. This new system should reduce the number of errors, speed up the process, and standardize the assessment of registration fees.

RAMP UP East launched the business registration project and pilot tested it in Charikar, Khost, and Mahmud Raq from January to June 2011. This project will allow these municipalities to track economic progress and tax collection. According to the Charikar revenue collection officer, “We have increased our revenues ten-fold by implementing this new system.” In June, RAMP UP East reported the successful results at a regional Mayor’s Conference in Kabul, and all the mayors attending requested permission to use the registration system in their own their municipalities. As of September 2011, 13,000 businesses had been registered.

In addition to this accomplishment, RAMP UP East is making progress toward providing more opportunities for women. Women have limited power in the political realm and face harsh restrictions on education and employment opportunities. International development organizations, including ICMA, are focused on educating Afghan citizens on gender issues. RAMP UP strives to provide opportunities for women and educate citizens about the importance of improving the lives of women.

RAMP UP East’s Gender Mainstreaming Team has programs designed to encourage the participation of women in public forums, inform RAMP UP East and local staff about gender mainstreaming, and include sensitivity to gender in implementing projects. By late 2011, the Gender Mainstreaming Team had led workshops for 265 RAMP UP and local staff members in most of the participating municipalities.

RAMP UP East plans to implement a small grants program in the fourteen participating provinces to fund programs that empower young women as well as men with the skills and knowledge to effectively participate politically in their communities. The grants program will underwrite workshops on communication, gender, civic education and governance, and management and leadership. RAMP UP East will also provide training for business owners about business planning and marketing and private-public partnerships.

RAMP UP North: Surveys and Improvement Plans

Currently, RAMP UP North is assisting the municipalities of Aybak, Faizabad, Kunduz, Maymana, Mazar-e-Sharif, Pul-e-Khumri, Sar-e-Pul, Sheberghan, and Taloqan. In the midst of working on municipal improvement plans, RAMP UP North recently conducted internal surveys in nine of the municipalities to determine the strengths, weaknesses, and needs in each community.

Based on the survey results, staff created a municipal management capacity building plan for each city, and four communities have already selected projects they intend to implement in the near future, including parks and waste management programs. The local governments in the communities are following the “learning by doing” system that ICMA developed in the course of its previous programs in Afghanistan, which enables them to manage these projects in a sustainable way.

RAMP UP West: Needs Assessment, Planning, and Training

In March 2011, RAMP UP West began establishing the essential framework needed to initiate future activities such as setting up offices, hiring staff, and planning projects. In each of its designated municipalities, RAMP UP conducted an internal survey, an external citizen survey of the local government’s performance, and an audit that examined city functions and operations.

With this information, RAMP UP created capacity building plans that provide guidelines for improving the government’s performance in each municipality. The audit revealed, for example, that the municipalities needed assistance creating or maintaining efficient filing systems, so RAMP UP West initiated and played a significant role in this project.

RAMP UP West also provided a training program on the roles and responsibilities of municipal governments, based in part on the Municipal Governance in Afghanistan manual developed by ICMA’s Afghanistan Municipal Strengthening Program (AMSP). Furthermore, RAMP UP West began teaching strategic communications skills to the government officials, allowing them to showcase the government’s accomplishments to the public. RAMP UP will devise a communications plan for each community and implement it within the next year.

RAMP UP East and West are currently in their first option year, while RAMP UP North will begin its first option year in February 2012. All three programs have the possibility of gaining a second option year based on the achievement of their objectives. At the end of these programs, the local governments in all of the participating municipalities should be more self-sufficient, reliable, and credible to their citizens. With the assistance of the RAMP UP staff, the newfound knowledge of municipal responsibilities and leadership, and new skill sets, these governments will have the ability to make a beneficial impact in their communities.

According to Michael Kunz, Senior Governance Advisor overseeing ICMA's three RAMP UP programs,  "Thanks to the RAMP UP program, local staff in Afghanistan are gaining the tools to improve local services and economic stability, benefit women and youth, and gain the confidence of residents. ICMA is pleased to be a part of this significant effort to strengthen local governance in the country."

To learn more, visit the Afghanistan section of the ICMA website and the International Development topic area in the Knowledge Network, or contact international@icma.org.