The Board of Directors of the African Development Fund on Wednesday in Tunis approved a grant of 2.55 million Units of Account* (US$ 3.9 million or CFA 1.9 billion) to finance the Expenditure Circuit and Poverty Indicators Improvement Support Project.
The project will contribute to strengthen the institutional framework of the fight against poverty through support to the structures involved in the allocation and implementation of pro-poor resources, control of the regularity of expenditure and setting of indicators enabling a better monitoring and assessment of the impact of the said expenditures on poverty reduction.
To attain these objectives, the project will comprise the following components: * streamlining of budget preparation and implementation; * strengthening of internal and external budget control structures; * capacity building in socio-economic statistics for poverty reduction strategy papers monitoring and evaluation.
By contributing to improved efficiency in expenditure and the control system, and enabling the production of reliable indicators for monitoring the impact of budgetary expenditure on poverty reduction, the project will foster good governance at three levels, namely transparency, accountability and the fight against fraud and corruption.
The effects of the successive conflicts that Congo has experienced in terms of the weak capacities of the national administration due to the massive departure of qualified officers, the lack of a system of training and retraining of State personnel and the under-equipment of structures constitute major constraints on the achievement of the poverty reduction strategies objectives. To combat poverty effectively, the Government has undertaken to restore the essential functions of the State by focusing on the efficiency of structures involved in budgetary management, control at all levels (administrative, judicial and legislative) and the creation of databases to enable monitoring of poverty reduction efforts.
The African Development Bank Group commenced its operations in Congo in 1972. To date, its cumulative commitments in the country stand at US$ 378 million (CFA 197 billion) in 29 projects.
