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Mozambique: Government And Donors Begin Joint Review
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Agencia de Informacao de Mocambique (Maputo)
7 March 2008
Posted to the web 7 March 2008
Maputo
The Mozambican government and those of its foreign partners who provide direct support to the state budget on Friday began their joint review of performance in 2007, centring on the four key areas of poverty and macro-economic management, good governance, economic development, and human capital.
To undertake this exercise, which will last until the end of May, 24 working groups have been set up. They will be looking at 40 indicators for the government's performance agreed last year. The performance of the donors (on such issues as whether the provided the funds pledged in due time) will be undertaken by an independent body.
19 donors and funding agencies provide at least some of their aid as direct budget support, and are known as the "Programme Aid Partners". They include the World Bank, the African Development Bank, the European Union, most individual EU member states, Switzerland, Canada and Norway. The only major donors not in this group are the United States and Japan.
According to the National Director of Planning, Momade Pierarly, "the Joint Review will let us know to what extent the government and the cooperation partners have complied with their responsibilities. It will set the targets for 2008 in terms of pledges of support for the government's budget, and sketch indicative targets for 2009".
In 2007, the 19 Programme Aid Partners provided 403 million US dollars in direct budget support, which was a third of the total foreign aid that Mozambique received that year.
In the area of macro-economic management and poverty, the Joint Review will look in particular at financial decentralization - at the proportion of the state budget which is transferred to the provinces, districts and municipalities. The figures for 2007 have been taken as the basis for the targets for such transfers in 2008.
Last year, 22 per cent of the budget was transferred to the provinces, 2.7 per cent to the districts, and 0.7 per cent to the municipalities. A slight rise is expected this year, with 23.3 per cent of the budget transferred to the provinces, 3.7 per cent to the districts, and 0.9 per cent to the municipalities.
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In the area of governance, the Review will look at areas where the government has often failed to meet targets, such as the justice system, and public sector reform. Also included in this area is the performance of the District Consultative Councils, in terms of the number of meetings they have held per year, and whether there has been transparent management of the Local Initiative Investment Fund. This fund, of at least seven million meticais (280,000 US dollars) per district per year, is supposed to be spent on initiatives to produce food and generate employment, and the Consultative Councils are key to deciding which projects should benefit from it.
It is expected that the results of the Joint Review will be made publicly known on 22 May, when the 19 partners will confirm their contributions to this year's budget.
Sam/pf (505)
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