How committed are African governments to budget for children?

Yehualashet Mekonen

Senior Programme Manager,

The African Child Policy Forum (ACPF)

NGO Group for CRC

Annual GA meeting, March 11, 2011

Geneva

Outline of the presentation The CRC and government accountability

Budgets and child wellbeing: The link

How committed are African governments to budget for children

The Scorecard

Key priority areas for action

Encouraging improvements in accountability for children and child wellbeing.

But still, many governments are not doing what they could have done.

ACPF’s Child-Friendliness Index (CFI) is a contribution to monitoring compliance and expedite implementation of the CRC.

CRC was used as a framework to identify the dimensions and indicators:

1. Legal and policy framework put in place to protect

2. Governments’ budgetary commitment to provide for

3. The efforts governments put to ensure child participation

The CRC and government accountability

The CRC and government accountability . . .

Mauritius  Namibia  Tunisia  LibyaMoroccoKenya  South Africa  Malawi  AlgeriaCape Verde  Rwanda 

Burkina Faso 

Malawi  Botswana  Burkina Faso  Seychelles  Namibia  Tunisia  Swaziland  Cape Verde  Mauritius  South Africa  Djibouti 

What else emerged from the analysis?The need for a two-pronged approach to ensure child wellbeing:

Pro-child laws and policies Adequate budgets for children

What was the result from the 2008 assessment?The most child-friendly

Countries that performed well in budgetary terms

Child wellbeing outcomes/ Delivery of

services

Efficiency and effectiveness in budget implementation

Volume and composition of

budget for children

Review of policies, economic

prospects, draft allocation

Transparency, citizen’s

participation and approval

How does budget affect child wellbeing?

BUDGETS AND CHILD WELLBEING: THE LINK

Realisation of the rights provided for in the CRC entail costs.

Budgets have greater impact on children in countries where parents have limited capacity to provide for their children.

Governments have to take a deliberate action to budget for children.

BUDGETS AND CHILD WELLBEING: THE LINK

What do we mean by budgeting for children?It refers to a budget system in which children’s best interests come first.Allocation of sufficient budgets to progressively realise child rights. It is about ensuring efficient utilisation and effective targeting to achieve concrete wellbeing outcomes?Involves creation of a space for children’s participation

Analysing budgets from a child rights perspectiveAllows examining whether governments are utilising the maximum amount of their available resources to meet their obligations to children.Four operational categories of budgets for children have been identified: budgets for child development, health, education and social protection.

How committed are African governments to budget for children?

Early childhood

Pre-school

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School programmes

Job training

Pre-school Post-school Age

Investment in early childhood development (ECD) . . .Early childhood is a period when the foundations for physical and cognitive developments are laid.Deprivations during early childhood have lasting consequences on health, behaviour and learning outcomes.

From economic perspective, ECD has the highest rate of return.

How committed are African governments?

Despite these facts, ECD: Has not received the attention it deserves

in Africa. Only 20 of the 52 countries studied in

Africa had official ECD programmes. Less than two per cent of the education

budget is used for pre-primary education.

Pre-school education services, for example, are limited to urban areas and to affluent families, excluding vulnerable groups of children.

How committed are African governments?

How much is budgeted for education? . . .

Only six countries kept their promise to the Dakar commitment.

Tendency to strive to achieve education participation targets at the expense of quality.

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0 5 10 15

SudanEquatorial …

Central …GuineaCongo …Chad

MEDIAN …Kenya

TunisiaSwazilandBotswana

DjiboutiLesotho

Per cent

How committed are African governments?

How much is budgeted for the health of children? . . .

Only four countries – Liberia, Rwanda, Tanzania and Zambia - were able to achieve the Abuja target of committing 15 per cent of their budget to health in 2008.2.4

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How committed are African governments?

Yet, many countries still have high rates of child mortality.

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0 50 100 150 200 250

Congo (Brazzaville)Cameroon

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BurundiEquatorial Guinea

NigerCentral African Republic

NigeriaMali

Guinea-BissauDRC

AngolaChad

Deaths per thousand live births

Target for 2015Level in 2009

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How committed are African governments?

Budgeting for social protection . . .

The unmet need for SP is estimated at 80%.

SP is the most neglected sector in Africa.

Most countries budget about 3% of their GDP

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The Scorecard

All the elements of budgeting for children were summarised into Performance Index for Budgeting for Children

The most committed governments

Country Rank

Tanzania  1

Mozambique  2

Niger  3

Gabon  4

Senegal  5

Tunisia  6

Seychelles  7

Algeria 8

Cape Verde  9

South Africa  10

What did these countries do?They allocated a relatively high percentage of their public resources to sectors benefiting children,Progressively increased these allocations over time.

The Scorecard . . .

Lower share of their budgets go to sectors benefiting children

Decline in allocation over the years.

Relatively higher expenditure for military

The least committed governments

Country Rank

Sudan  52Guinea-Bissau  51Eritrea  50Burundi  49Dem. Rep. Congo  48Comoros  47Sierra Leone  46Angola  45Guinea  44Central African Republic  43

What does the progress look like since 2008?

The Scorecard. . .

Countries with significant

improvement

Countries which declined in their

performance

Tanzania  Malawi 

Mozambique  Burkina Faso 

São Tomé and   Djibouti 

Benin  Lesotho 

Zambia  Burundi 

Gambia  Dem. Rep. Congo 

Niger  Mali 

Senegal  Namibia 

The improvements in ranking were largely due to substantial increases in:

Investment in the health and education of childrenCommitment to financing national immunisation programmes, andReduction in military spending.

The Scorecard. . .

Relationship between budgetary commitment and per capita revenue

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Budgetary Commitment IndexScore for per capita revenue

Higher income,lower

budgetary commitment

Low income,higher

budgetary commitment

The three key messages that emerged from the analysis:

1.The need to give priority to the rights and wellbeing of children in budgetary allocation and implementation.

2.Ensuring efficient use of resources through transparent budgetary frameworks and processes.

3.Ensuring adequate support for, and investment in, early childhood development.

Key priority areas for action

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