Equitable Budgeting: A step towards more equitable, inclusive and peaceful societies

June 25, 2020 08:58:48 AM Published by: PERL


Equitable Budgeting: A step towards more equitable, inclusive and peaceful societies

The destabilising impact of the COVID-19 crisis calls for the formulation of policies, budgets and plans that protect the health, livelihood and access to education for all, including the most vulnerable and marginalised; and calls for adaptation to the economic and fiscal consequences caused by the pandemic.

Equitable Budgeting is a practical and effective answer to this challenge. Equitable budgeting considers the different needs of women, men and marginalised groups, and the differential impact of policies on each group to foster meaningful access to public goods and services for all. It makes governments accountable for translating their equity commitments into budgetary commitments and actual expenditure. Equitable Budgeting contributes to building fairer and more peaceful societies.

Ahead of the 2021 budget preparation, PERL has developed an Equitable Budgeting Guide. The guide describes practices that Nigerian States can adopt to develop and implement gender equitable and socially inclusive budgets and provides step-by-step directions and tools to make the task easier.

The resources below come from a PERL webinar titled “Introduction to Equitable Budgeting”, held on 18th June, 2020 and hosted by the Borno, Adamawa and Yobe (BAY) States Women in Governance (WinG) Community of Practice members and their teams. The online session was aimed at building the capacity of the WinG CoP members on equitable budgeting and enabling them to influence budgets, policies and strategies to be more inclusive and equitable ahead of the 2021 budget preparation. PERL presented its new Equitable Budgeting Guide developed as part of its Public Financial Management Suite.

Representatives of central planning and budgeting Ministries, Department and Agencies (MDAs) attended the webinar, as well as officials from service delivery MDAs and civil society groups and media.

Please reach out to PERL for further guidance as you prepare your state's 2021 budget and be on the look-out for additional public financial management and equitable budgeting resources that PERL will release in the coming weeks!

 
You can download the slides, recordings and the Equitable Budgeting Guide below:
  • Download Equitable Budgeting Webinar Agenda
  • Download Summary of the Equitable Budgeting Guide
  • Download the Equitable Budgeting Guide
  • Download Presentation: Introduction to PERL’s Equitable Budgeting Guide
  • Download Presentation: Equitable Budgeting: Sharing Abia State Experience and the Journey So Far
Download Full Video of Webinar 
Download Video of Presentation: Equitable & Inclusive Budgeting: A brief definition by Titi Fakoya
Download Video of Presentation: The PERL Equitable Budgeting Guide by Chris Rowe
Download Video of Presentation: Promoting Equity throughout the Budget Process by Chidiebere Ibe
 
Description and Benefit of the Equitable Budgeting Guide

The Equitable Budgeting Guide describes practices that Nigerian States can adopt to develop gender equitable and socially inclusive (GESI) realistic budgets and provides step-by-step directions and tools to make the task easier. The guide sets out the important stages in preparing equitable realistic budgets, the process of mainstreaming gender and social inclusion into the budget and describes government processes for planning, preparing, implementing, monitoring and evaluating budgets. The guide also describes the processes in legislative budgetary oversight, together with processes for monitoring and tracking budget performance to ensure transparency and accountability in the use of public resources.

This guide will be particularly useful to key government actors, budget officials in particular, to produce equitable and realistic budgets that are socially inclusive and in effect reduce inequality and poverty.

  • The guide is expected to enable government to target resources to where they are most needed.
  • It should promote efficiency, accountability and transparency in government spending.
  • It provides the key steps in mainstreaming equitable and inclusion mandates at various stages of the budget process, starting from the development of the MTSS to the annual budget.
  • Adoption of the guide as a model could enhance responsive service delivery.