Country Partnership Strategy (CPS), ADB

The Country Partnership Strategy (CPS) is the Asian Development Bank's medium-term planning document for each of its Developing Member Countries, setting out the sectors ADB will invest in, the expected lending volume, and the development outcomes targeted over a three-to-five-year horizon.

What is the Country Partnership Strategy (CPS), ADB?

Each CPS is prepared by ADB in close consultation with the borrowing government and covers the bank's planned engagement for a specific country over the strategy period. It identifies priority sectors such as transport, energy, water, urban development, or health, explains the rationale for ADB involvement in each, and sets out an indicative pipeline of loans, grants, and technical assistance. The CPS is the upstream planning layer that eventually generates individual projects, each of which then produces a procurement-plan and, in turn, published tender notices.

ADB publishes CPSs on its website and updates them through annual Country Operations Business Plans, which translate the medium-term strategy into a rolling three-year pipeline. For a dmc (Developing Member Country), the CPS is effectively a statement of which sectors will receive large capital infusions and where the supply chain for construction, equipment, and consulting services will be activated. CPS documents are publicly available and can be downloaded at no cost.

Why the CPS matters for bidders

A supplier that reads the CPS for a target country can identify which sectors ADB is committed to funding before individual contracts are advertised, giving a meaningful lead time advantage over competitors who wait for the gpn to appear. For example, if the CPS for a Central Asian country commits USD 2 billion to transport over five years, a roads contractor or traffic-management consulting firm can begin building country relationships, registering local partners, and preparing technical capacity documentation years in advance of tender publication. CPS documents also reveal the expected financing modalities, whether loans or grants, and whether co-financiers such as the World Bank or bilateral agencies are involved, which can affect eligibility and document requirements. Treating the CPS as a forward pipeline rather than a background document is how experienced international suppliers systematically build their ADB market position.

FAQ

How often is the CPS updated?

A full CPS covers three to five years. ADB updates it annually through the Country Operations Business Plan, which provides a rolling three-year indicative pipeline within the CPS framework.

Where can I find CPS documents?

ADB publishes all CPS documents on its website under each country's page. They are free to download and include the main strategy document, sector assessments, and the indicative project pipeline.

Does the CPS cover consulting assignments as well as civil works?

Yes. The CPS and its annual updates identify technical assistance operations alongside investment lending, so consulting firms can identify advisory and capacity-building work in the pipeline alongside infrastructure contracts.