Newsletter 46 – Feb 2020

Improving public financial and investments management through the use of spending data and
government-civil society coalitions

Year 2020 open data activities are ready to begin!
Whether your focus is on better spending towards the Sustainable Development Goals or improving public investments through social monitoring of projects, we invite all GIFT stewards and partners to participate in hosting collaborative events to enable the better use of data.

Read how they work and what happened last year. Choose the one that better fits your purpose!
We already have ongoing organization of events in Argentina, Chile, Costa Rica, Colombia, Indonesia, Mexico and Uruguay, if you are interested in joining the organization in these countries let know soon.

Data On The Streets

Better Budget

Data for Policy 2020

Continuing our quest to bring innovative uses of data, we are holding a special track on Sustainable Development Goals and data at the Data for Policy 2020 conference. Data for Policy is a premier global forum for interdisciplinary and cross-sector discussions around the impact and potentials of the digital revolution in the government sector. This is the global forum around theories, applications and implications of data science innovation in governance and the public sector.

This special track aims at bringing together experts from governments, multilateral organizations, NGOs, the private sector, and the scientific community to exchange their latest advancements in generating and harnessing data to achieve the SDGs. Since the challenges of the 2030 Agenda vary between countries, subnational regions, government levels, sectors, etc., this track seeks to provide a forum where diverse experiences and solutions cross-fertilize each other. Therefore, this special track is agnostic about the topical application. Instead, it emphasizes aspects related to the generation of data; on the relevant challenges; on context-specific stakeholder needs; and on novel quantitative methods.

Submissions are now open: http://bit.ly/DataForSDGs

COMMUNITY WALL

Annual Award Prof. Dr. Marijan Hanžeković Prize
Institute of Public Finance, Croatia
February 12

The Trust is inviting for competition the theoretical, empirical and policy-oriented papers in the field of the public sector economics. Papers can analyze the role and functioning of the public sector at macroeconomic, sectoral and microeconomic levels, in both advanced and emerging market economies. Particularly sought are papers providing new ways of looking at things, new assessments, judgements and knowledge.

Articles and review articles from the domain of public sector economics can be entered for the competition: http://zaklada.ijf.hr/eng/competition/

Deadline for submission is June 1, 2020

Relaunch of Austria’s Open Spending Portal
Bernhard Krabina
February 10

Until 2019 Austrian municipalities followed the rules of cameralistic system. The budgeting and also accounting were done according to a cash-flow oriented system. The introduction of the new accrual accounting system in Austria as of 2020 made it necessary to implement a major relaunch of the Open Spending platform, completely redesigned.

Read more here.

The Global Anticorruption Podcast
Kickback
February 24

Roberto de Michele and Francesco De Simone, both Modernization of the State experts from the Inter-American Development Bank. As usual, the interview kicks off with providing some information on both interviewees’ background and motivation to do work on (anti-)corruption. The interview pursues to outline the four main clusters of anti-corruption work by the IDB: 1. financial integrity supporting countries with anti-money laundering tax transparency 2. governance in the extractive sector 3. control systems government oversight 4. open government access to information, open government partnership. The three experts discuss how IDB standards can ensure progress in anti-corruption and what the track record of each assistance project has been.

Listen the Podcast here.

UPCOMING EVENTS

Launch of the Fiscal Openness Accelerator Project
Fiscal transparency for public participation for a better use of public resources
IBP/GIFT
Pretoria. March 2-3

The International Budget Partnership (IBP, a GIFT Lead Steward) and GIFT have developed the Fiscal Openness Accelerator, a project to deepen work in improving transparency and enhancing public participation in fiscal policies. During the first week of March we will meet with the five countries participating from Africa: Benin, Liberia, Nigeria, Senegal and South Africa. The materials in anticipation for the meeting can be consulted in this new repository for the project. We will keep posting updates on the process in the coming newsletters.

https://fiscaltransparency.net/fiscal-openness-acceleration-project/