Covid-19 budgeting for SDGs note Postscript

23 May 2020

The Budgeting for SDGs Note was written, when we could not know how extraordinary important, probably more than ever, both the achievement of SDGs and the budgeting for this achievement would soon become. For the governments, the pandemics suddenly means decreased budget revenues and increased budget expenditures. For the citizens, it might mean life or death, i.e. drastic changes in access to health, jobs, education, welfare, security and numerous other public services.

Governments are stepping in, undertaking various pandemic related measures both at national and subnational government levels - direct transfers, tax expenditures, etc. The policy tracker, summarizing the key economic responses, governments of 193 countries are taking to limit the human and economic impact of the pandemic is daily updated at IMF. How will all these funds be spent, to whom they will be directed, who will benefit, etc. are the questions that might be answered only if governments (both national and subnational) will be completely transparent and fully disclose all the data and information. Only the full disclosure would enable public participation and scrutiny over these funds and their impact on achieving SDGs.

Although there are governments (as elaborated in the Note) that have been already transparently budgeting for SDGs and as there are governments that could be expected to transparently budget for the pandemics, majority of countries have low levels even of the overall budget transparency (BT). The most recent, 2019 Open Budget Survey (OBS) of the International Budget Partnership (IBP), which assesses the state and trends in BT, opportunities for public participation in budget processes and roles of oversight institutions shows that the global average BT score of 117 surveyed countries is just 45 out of 100. That means that global BT is insufficient, as a score of 61 is considered the minimum threshold for the informed public debate on budgets and only 26% of surveyed countries meets this benchmark. Few countries provide meaningful opportunities for public participation and only quarter of them scores at adequate levels of oversight by both the legislature and supreme audit institutions.

While the average global BT score is insufficient, the scores for some of the questions particularly important in the times of pandemic are unfortunately even much worse. For example, 85% of surveyed countries is not – in their executive budget proposals nor in any supporting budget documentation – presenting information on tax expenditures (exceptions or other preferences in the tax code provided for specified entities, individuals, or activities, with a statement of purpose or policy rationale, a listing of the intended beneficiaries and an estimate of the revenue foregone) (Q45). Or, 70% is not – in their executive budget proposals nor in any supporting budget documentation – presenting information on quasi-fiscal activities for at least the budget year (with a statement of purpose or policy rationale for the quasi-fiscal activity, i.e., the reason for engaging in this activity and the identification of intended beneficiaries) (Q38).

Particularly worrying is, that almost 70% of countries is not presenting alternative displays of expenditures (such as by gender, by age, by income, or by region) to illustrate the financial impact of policies on different groups of citizens, for at least the budget year in their executive budget proposals (Q36) nor are they presenting the differences between the enacted level of funds for policies (both new proposals and existing policies) that are intended to benefit directly the country’s most impoverished populations and the actual outcome in their year-end reports (Q94).

However, despite these poor overall results, good examples are found in nearly all parts of the world and the top-tier countries – New Zealand, South Africa, Sweden, Mexico, Georgia and Brazil – which are releasing extensive budget information (scoring 81 or higher), are not necessarily the richest nor most developed ones. The same holds for e.g. Guatemala, Indonesia, Kyrgyz Republic and Ukraine which all rapidly improved in relatively short time (reaching threshold of 61).

As shown in the IBP’s, “How Transparent are Governments When it Comes to Their Budget’s Impact on Poverty and Inequality?” there are good examples to follow, e.g.:

- Bangladesh’s 2017-18 Budget includes a detailed supplementary Gender Budgeting Report, presenting the spending dedicated to advancing women across various departments;
- The UK’s 2017 Budget provided a distributional analysis of the budget by households in different income groups;
- South Africa’s 2017 Budget Review’s presentation of intergovernmental transfers, discusses the redistribution resulting from national revenue flowing to the provinces and municipalities and presents the allocations on a per capita basis;
- Pakistan’s 2017-18 Budget Proposal provides a detailed breakdown of pro-poor expenditure. The government sets out policy priorities, expected outputs, and estimates of past and future spending for several programs aimed at poverty alleviation and provides a comprehensive overview of ongoing policies, including a chapter on social safety nets, covering both financial and performance information of poverty alleviation schemes over a period of eight years.

Transparent management of public funds has been a constant requirement, but in times of Covid-19 affected budget deviations, i.e. decreasing revenue and increasing expenditure, it has to be even more pronounced. The extraordinary circumstances in which decisions sometimes should be made over the night cannot be an excuse for the lack of transparency. These decisions may affect the efficiency and equity of revenue and expenditure, the economic, social and political circumstances and consequently the wellbeing of citizens, particularly of the marginal and excluded ones. Demands for SDGs BT should be complemented with demands for Covid-19 BT. All governments’ budgetary decisions’ information and data – including and particularly emphasizing those related to the achievement of SDGs and those related to Covid-19 – have to be fully transparent to all parts and sectors of governments, parliaments, oversight institutions and general public.

Katarina Ott, member of the Committee of Experts on Public Administration