COLLABORATIVE AFRICA BUDGET
REFORM INITIATIVE (CABRI)
Economic Commission for Africa
Abuja, May 2005
Covered today
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What is CABRI
Context of the Initiative
Central role of budget officials
Objectives of CABRI
Expected results
First activity – budget reform seminar
Post-seminar publications
Network for senior budget officials
Second CABRI in Nairobi
Conclusion
What is CABRI?
• African led and managed initiative
• Comprises senior budget officials responsible for
budget compilation and related reforms
• Its aim is to:
– support reform efforts
– improve public finance management, and
– contribute to improved service delivery and the attainment of
welfare goals.
• Its immediate objective is:
– Set up a forum that brings together budget officials for the
purpose of sharing experiences, deliberating on
improvements to budgeting systems and deciding on
collaborative programmes
Context of the Initiative
• Strong public finance management institutions
critical for the functioning of an effective and
democratic state
• Efficacy of budget planning determines the success
of government’s ability to deliver on welfare
objectives
• Both internal and external pressure is rising for
increased accountability and transparency of public
finances
• Access to development assistance often dependent
on showing progress towards fiscal management
benchmarks
Context of the Initiative
(ii)
• Even when public expenditure management reforms
have been ongoing for years, achievement of
credible and transparent budgets resulting in
relevant and affordable service delivery is still far off
• Many critical lessons have been learnt on financial
management reforms, but mostly documented and
discussed by external proponents of reforms, rather
than those at the core of the reforms
• Experience has highlighted the critical importance of
country-owned, -led and –managed initiatives that
are tailored to local circumstances
Context of the Initiative
(iii)
• Interest of senior budget officials in learning from
their peers in other African countries increasingly
apparent
• Requests for information, exchange visits,
presentations at in-country workshops, etc
• In the interest of peer-to-peer lesson sharing, the
ministries of finance of South Africa, Mozambique
and Uganda initiated CABRI
Senior Budget Officials
core to reform efforts
• Success of reform efforts depends critically on the
capability of officials in ministries of finance to analyse
existing system deficiencies, decide on the desired
changes and set a course towards those changes.
• The ability of officials to engage with the process is
dependent on their knowledge and understanding of:
– what makes for effective public financial management
systems,
– what alternative solutions to problems have been tried and
tested elsewhere and
– how to sequence and implement reforms towards such
systems.
CABRI ~ Objectives
• Bolster the capacity of senior budget officials to take
an active role in planning and managing reforms
• Expand and share the existing knowledge of what
works, what not and why, by making explicit the
knowledge African officials hold on reform modalities
• Objectives aligned with New Partnership for Africa’s
Development, the work done on the Millennium
Development Goals and the Commission for Africa
• CABRI provides a pillar that is crucial for the
achievement of the objectives embodied in these
initiatives
CABRI – Expected Results
• Improved in-country capacity for designing,
implementing and assessing public financial
management reforms;
• Improved African resources for public financial
management reforms and the documentation of African
practitioner insights on budget reform success and
failures;
• Increased awareness and buy-in from political
principles on progress with, and constraints of public
financial management reforms on the continent.
Budget Reform Seminar ~
Pretoria, 1-3 December
2004
Participants:
• Angola, Botswana, Kenya, Lesotho, Malawi,
Mauritius, Mozambique, Namibia, Nigeria, Rwanda,
Senegal, South Africa, Tanzania, Uganda, Zambia
and Zimbabwe
• Organisations: OECD, World Bank, AFRITAC (IMF),
MEFMI, INWENT, Overseas Development Institute
• Donors: European Union, Development Cooperation
Ireland, GTZ
• Several international public finance experts
Budget Reform Seminar ~
Pretoria, 1-3 December
2004
• The programme was a combination of a themebased and case study based interaction, organised
around four central themes
– (i) budget credibility, (ii) multi-year budgeting, (iii) improving
quality of expenditure and (iv) reform design and
implementation
• Nine countries prepared case studies that served as
a basis for the presentations and discussions,
highlighting both successes and failures
• Twelve countries made presentations
Network for Senior
African Budget Officials
• Seminar also discussed benefits of a network of senior budget
officials (similar to the OECD Senior Budget Officials
Committee).
• Success factors of the OECD SBO are the open and informal
discussions, stability in membership, variety in countries and
models presented and the ownership of the network by
members.
• Participants noted that such a network in Africa, could
– engender benchmarking and self-checking on reform
programmes pursued
– promote managerial value as well as the sharing of
information and experiences.
Post-seminar publications
• Resource document targeted at practitioners and
contains the country case studies. Also included is
a summary paper, drawing out common themes,
lessons and challenges supported by short
additional pieces on public expenditure concepts.
• Overview/advocacy booklet targeted at a wide
audience. Provides an overview of the discussions
of the seminar and highlights progress made and
the importance of public expenditure management
systems in Africa.
Second CABRI meeting –
Nairobi 20-21 June 2005
• Hosted by the Kenyan Ministry of Finance in collaboration with
the National Treasury of South Africa
• Purpose is to concretise the proposal to launch a network of
senior African budget officials discussed at the Budget Reform
seminar held in December 2004.
• The outcome of the meeting will be an agreement on the
structure, membership, the programme and funding of the
network.
• Point person from each country that attended the Budget
Reform seminar, representatives from Burkina Faso,
Cameroon, Ethiopia, Egypt and Ghana will also be invited
Second CABRI meeting –
Nairobi 20-21 June 2005
• Proposed activities of the network are:
– Peer reviews of African public expenditure
management systems
– Annual thematic as well as networking meeting
of senior African budget officials
– Entertain requests for information and
preparation of meetings
– Depository for information on public expenditure
management systems in Africa
Network eventually to be pan-African
In conclusion..
• Given the importance of public finance institutions
in achieving development objectives, the network
will provide an excellent opportunity for those
central to the reforms to broaden their knowledge
and access information on peer expertise.
• The network will also help stimulate and
institutionalise intra-continental debate by African
decision makers on practical solutions to
challenging problems.