Publication: Pro-Poor Public Spending Reform : Uganda's Virtual Poverty Fund
Date
2006-03
ISSN
Published
2006-03
Author(s)
Williamson, Tim
Canagarajah, Sudharshan
Abstract
The Poverty Action Fund (PAF) was
introduced in Uganda in 1998 to reorient government
expenditures towards implementing its Poverty Education
Action Plan (PEAP) as well as to account for Heavily
Indebted Poor Country (HIPC) resource use. This paper notes
the successes of the PAR, the negative aspects, and the key
lessons learned. Successes include: reorienting budget
allocations towards pro-poor service delivery and
demonstrating the additionality of debt relief; mobilizing
donor resources and harmonizing conditions; and improved
budget predictability, transparency, and accountability.
The negative aspects include: unbalanced budget allocations,
biased budget implementation, partial monitoring and
evaluation, and no exit strategy. The key lessons were: To
be effective, a Virtual Poverty Fund (VPF) should be simple
and limited to the identification of Poverty Reduction
Strategy Paper (PRSP) priority expenditures in the budget
classification system; a VPF should be introduced in a way
that supports rather than replaces the implementation of
such comprehensive improvements in budget preparation and
implementation; and a VPF does not bypass the need to have a
PRSP and an effective budget process that identify priority
pro-poor expenditures to be included in the VPF as part of a
broader policy framework for growth and poverty reduction.
Citation
“Williamson, Tim; Canagarajah, Sudharshan. 2006. Pro-Poor Public Spending Reform : Uganda's Virtual Poverty Fund. PREM Notes; No. 108. © World Bank, Washington, DC. http://openknowledge.worldbank.org/entities/publication/b1bd2589-33f2-598f-a7be-aa07d1e5be17 License: CC BY 3.0 IGO.”