Over 15 years working in development field with multiple community projects across the country, one of the lessons that we’ve had is the importance of local partners’ cooperation in order to effectively carry out the project.
Budget Transparency, Accountability and Participation (BTAP) with CDI’s coordination implemented the project “Enhancing transparency and the participation of the citizensin managing the state budget” in Quang Tri province since 2015.
Mr. Nguyen Dang Anh, Deputy Head of Economic and Budget Department of Provincial People’s Council, shared one of his favorite activities in which BTAP and the experts coordinating with the Provincial People’s Council to develop a set of criteria for evaluating and consulting on the medium-term public investment portfolio in period 2016-2020, including the very specific criteria such as: being in accordance with planning; capital capacity; the proportion of beneficiaries; the equality within the beneficiaries.
The criteria has been effective tool for the Provincial People’s Council to adequately perform their role of expertisel and supervision. After applying the criteria, in the first six months of 2016, the Provincial People’s Council appraised 15 provincial projects, 3 of which were disapproved because they didn’t meet the requirements. In the second half of 2016, the People’s Council continued to evaluate 19 projects.
As a deputy of the Budget Economic Department and also the head of the BTAP Project Management Board, Mr. Anh paid much attention to the training and capacity building for the officials and members of the People’s Councils at all levels. All project activities witnessed the active participation of provincial, district and commune officials.
Overview of the workshop on State budget management: from practical initiatives to policy solutions. (Source: VNA)
He himself became a trainer for the provincial People’s Council upon his experience from the trainings of experts in finance and budgeting that he had taken part in. He then proactively proposed and served as the main trainer for 11 training courses on: Transparent state budget and promoting of community participation; State Budget Law 2015; Parliamentary Assembly and People’s Council Supervision Act 2015 and Supervisory Skills. Participants in the training courses were 778 delegates from People’s Councils at all levels.
With the up-coming support of the BTAP project, the provincial People’s Council plans to open more training courses to ensure that all People’s Council members are updated with new knowledge and skills.
While the project continues to be implemented, Mr. Anh says he has some ideas that he wants to carry out in the coming time such as: increase capacity building for People’s Councils at all levels; effectively use the resources and experts of the project with monitoring activities of the provincial People’s Council; extending the project activities to other districts.
Many difficulties are expected, but Mr. Anh believes that the close cooperation of the partners, as well as the increasing support of provincial leaders and officials at all levels is an important element to ensure the sustainability of the project and also one of the benefits the project has brought about.
Enhance the participation of all parties, ensure revenue collection for the locality
People’s Council of Hai Lang district proactively monitored, ensuring tax arrear collection and promoting transparency in budget revenues and expeditures in the district.
Under the project “Budget Transparency, Accountability and Participation” in Quang Tri province, Hai Lang District People’s Council – one ofthe beneficiaries has become increaseingly proactive engaging in the project after being trained and educated on finance and budgeting during their one year participation (2015 – 2016).
In particular, the Standing People’s Council has proposed and initiative with the Provincial Project Management Board to implement a sub-project to ensure more transparency in budget collection and expenditure activities in the district.
In order to increase the capacity of the district in collecting tax arrears, managing and funding, the Steering Committee implemented the initiatives with the participation of a number of related units to form a Coordination Group which included Planning and Finance Department, State Treasury, the district’s Fatherland Front, Tax Department, Office Land Registration, District Land Development Center, People’s Committee of Hai Xuan Commune, Hai Lam Commune People’s Committee.
The existing information was provided by functional units. As of October 2016, the tax debt accounted for a very high proportion, VND6.1 billion, seriously affecting the district’s budget revenue resulting in the reduction of the budget for all expenditures. This impacted the socio-economic situation in the area.
Based on the actual situation, specific actions have been implemented by the Coordination Group such as: Assessment of shortcomings in tax policy; Tax administration for enterprises; Coordiation of collection of tax arrears; Implementing resolutions, schemes, plans and documents of the district on budget collection and recovery; Collection and management, use of fees and funds in the area. Especially through direct communication with the parties, the group also discovered many other causes such as hidden revenue sources, some provisions in the Tax Law which weren’t complied with and the fact that the functional units weren’t determined to ensure revenue.
The group regularly reported on the implementation of activities while receiving meaningful support from the Project Management Unit. From collected information, the outcomes after the monitoring process and dialogues with stakeholders, the Group proposed specific solutions in the implementation plan.
After many efforts, the initiative of Hai Lang District Standing People’s Council during its initial phase, unexpectedly brought about significant results. The total debt collection was VND4.2 billion.
The reward from this initiative of the People’s Council was not only VND4.2 billion, but also the high level of accountability in the workplace, the mobilization of stakeholder engagement to tackle a local problem with limited resources is a good practice which should be expanded to other district.
Mr. Alejandro Montalban, Minister Counsellor, Head of Cooperation and Development Section, EU Delegation to Vietnam, at Workshop on State budget management from practical initiatives to policy solutions.
(Source: Dieu Thien/thoibaotaichinhvietnam.vn)
"State budget management is a central piece of the overall country’s public
financial management system (so call PFM system) which plays a vital role in
the overall development process. A sound PFM system is essential to ensure
the accountability, efficiency and effectiveness in the management of public
resources and delivery of services. Therefore, it is critical to the
achievement of public policy objectives, including achievement of the
sustainable development goals.
Over the past years, the EU have been
providing financial and techical support to strengthen the country’s PFM
system and we are pleased to observe the positive progress made in reforming
the system and to better align it with internal good practice," said Mr.
Alejandro Montalban, Minister Counsellor, Head of Cooperation and
Development Section, EU Delegation to Vietnam, at Workshop on State budget management from practical initiatives to policy solutions at the end of March 2018./. |