GIFT
Stewards Meeting. Cascais,
Portugal October
17
This
years’ General Stewards
Meeting was hosted by the
Municipality of Cascais,
Portugal, one of the winners
of the GIFT
Public Participation Award
of 2017. During the meeting
three main issues for the
Network were addressed: 1) analysis
of the progress of
each country part
represented regarding global
measurements of fiscal
transparency; 2) the
presentation of the process
for the International Budget
Partnership – GIFTpilots
of public participation in
the budget process and 3) changes
in the Network operating
rules and
procedures derived from the
Lead Stewards meetings,
which have implications on
the Steward’s interaction
and engagement.
A salient result of the
meeting was the support
given by the GIFT
General Stewards Meeting to
the changes to the Operating
Rules. These changes
establish that all members
will present a set of
concrete and measurable
commitments to improve
fiscal transparency and
participation, with the
engagement to report back
periodically on progress to
GIFT The
network members will
continue to encourage and
support each other by peer
learning and technical
collaboration. Raising the
bar for the GIFT
members in their fiscal
transparency and
participation objectives,
represents a timely and
relevant evolution for a
network that is moving
strongly towards becoming a
group of fiscal transparency
champions, willing to work
together in continuously
advancing our agenda and
leading by example.
PEMPAL-GIFT
Learning Visit on Public
Participation. Cascais,
Portugal October
16-17
This
year the PEMPAL
and GIFT
communities gathered to
learn more about different
approaches to public
participation in the
budget cycle. During these
peer-learning sessions,
countries shared their
experiences on
implementing budget
literacy projects;
participatory budgeting,
going from the local level
to the national level;
some specific experiences
with participation on the
establishment of budget
ceilings (Kyrgyz Republic)
and implementing
participation in local
planning of national
transfers (Uruguay), as
well as setting up digital
tools to enhance public
participation.
Smart
Citizenship Academy.
Cascais, Portugal October
10-13
In
the course of four days
the Smart Citizenship
Academy “School of
Participation” took place
in the brand new
Carcavelos Campus of Nova
School of Business &
Economics University, a
partner
of Cascais municipality
for this program. With
specialists from around
the world, this first
edition of the course
presented different
examples of Participatory
Budget around the world as
well as its trends and
evolution, with an
in-depth analysis of the
process and mechanisms of
the Particpatory Budget of
Cascais. Break-out groups
also worked in proposing
ways to engage the youth
in participation
mechanisms, as well as
setting up indicators for
Participatory Budgets.
The course had students
working on-site to reflect
the workshop in cartoons.
You can see the results
below:
COMMUNITY
WALL
2018
World Bank and
International Monetary
Fund Meeting in Bali,
Indonesia and the Launch
of the new Human Capital
Index October
8-14
The
Development Committee
stressed on the critical
importance of building
human capital. To help
countries make more
effective investments on
people, the World Bank
Groups launched the new
Human Capital Index at the
meetings, as part of a
global Human
Capital Project
that support long-term,
measurable progress toward
better outcome in
education, health,
nutrition and social
protection. The Human
Capital Index quantifies
the contribution of health
and education to the
productivity of the next
generation of workers.
Countries can use it to
assess how much income
they are foregoing because
of human capital gaps, and
how much faster they can
turn these losses into
gains if they act now.
Public
Sector Economics
conference in Zagreb,
Croatia October
26
The
Institute of Public
Finance in cooperation
with the International
Budget Partnership, GIFT
Steward and Lead Steward,
respectively, and
Friedrich Ebert Stiftung
organized the annual
Public Sector
Economics conference dedicated
to fiscal transparency,
citizen participation in
fiscal processes and
government
accountability. The
conference, Fiscal
Openness: Transparency,
Participation and
Accountability in Fiscal
Policies addressed
the current state and
trends in fiscal openness
at both national and
sub-national levels. The
main goal of the
conference was to initiate
and encourage discussions
among scientists, public
sector experts and general
public to address the
contemporary challenges
faced by the public sector
and foster more effective
and efficient ways of
collecting, allocating and
spending public resources.
The
World Bank introduces the
online guide to the World
Development Indicators:
A new way to discover
data on development
To
compile the World
Development Indicators (WDI),
the World Bank draws from
officially recognized
sources and including
national, regional, and
global estimates, the WDI
provides access to almost
1,600 indicators for 217
economies, with some time
series extending back more
than 50 years . An annual World
Development Indicatorsreport was
available in print or PDF
format until last year.
This year, the World
Development
Indicators website has
been introduced. This is
“a new discovery tool and
storytelling platform for
our data which takes users
behind the scenes with
information about data
coverage, curation, and
methodologies. The goal is
to provide a useful,
easily accessible guide to
the database and make it
easy for users to discover
what type of indicators
are available, how they’re
collected, and how they
can be visualized to
analyze development
trends.” (The DATABlog)
The
Accountability research
Center webpage is one year
old! Help
celebrate with them and take
a look
at this resource site!
UPCOMING
Global
Partnership for Social
Accountability Forum 2018-
Money Matters: Public
Finance and Social
Accountability for Human
Capital October
30 – November 1
The 2018
Global Partners Forum of
the Global Partnership for
Social Accountability of
the World Bank is
organized in collaboration
with the International
Budget Partnership
and the GIFTnetwork.
Great discussions are
expected on Money matters
for human capital
improvement, impactful
public service delivery,
good schools and reliable
health services depend on
public finance
transparency, social
accountability and
citizen participation. the
Global Partners
Forum. Stay tuned: #GPSAForum, #SocialAcc#PublicFinance, https://www.thegpsa.org/forum/global-partners-forum-2018
Webinar-
Communicating the budget.
How to promote the use of
budget information Nov.
7 at 9:00 EST
In
this webinar, participants
will learn from the
experience of Russia,
Georgia and Indonesia, where
GIFT
partners have developed
strong communication
strategies to make the
budget data and process, and
the accountability cycle
understandable and
meaningful for citizens.
Relevant experiences to
bring budget information to
the public will also be
explored, such as the
communication strategy that
the Public Expenditure
Management Peer Assisted
Learning network has
developed to assist budget
authorities in Central Asia
and Central and Eastern
Europe to publish and
communicate fiscal and
budget information in ways
that are relevant for
citizens.
Presenters: Anna Belenchuck,
Ministry of Finance, Russia/
Public Expenditure
Management Peer Assisted
Learning Network (PEMPAL),
Natia Gulua, Ministry of
Finance, Georgia [TBC] and
Wawan Sunarjo, Ministry of
Finance, Indonesia.
You can help start the
conversation, by advancing
your questions to our
amazing presenters via
Twitter @fiscaltrans.
Available
now in SPANISH:
GIFT Guide on Public
Participation in Fiscal
Transparency Principles
and Mechanisms!
Public
Participation cases from
around the world!
Webinar-
Building fiscal
transparency portals
This
webinar addresses the
experiences of Brazil and
South Africa in building
fiscal transparency portals
that respond to users needs
and preferences. Otávio
Neves, Secretariat of
Transparency and Corruption
Prevention, Brazil shares
their experiences in
revamping their fiscal
transparency portal, which
was first launched in 2004,
and presents its main
features, while discussing
the logic that guided this
effort. Carmela Zigoni from
the Institute for
Socioeconomic Studies
(INESC) takes stock of the
improvements in the new
portal, as well as the
trade-offs involved, and
reflects on the steps that
still need to be taken to
involve data beneficiaries
and users. To learn from the
South Africa experience,
Raquel Ferreira from the
National Treasury and
Zukiswa Kota from Public
Service Accountability
Monitor (PSAM) present the
development of a unique
collaboration between the
Treasury and a group of CSOs
to develop a portal that
makes budget data
accessible, user-friendly
and empowering. Ferreira
and Kota stress the need for
adaptability in this process
that requires trust and a
deep understanding between
civil society and
government.
