Programme budgeting is always a topical issue within the CABRI fora. Many countries are currently grappling with how to design and implement programme-based budgets. The Ministry of Finance and Economic Empowerment in Mauritius (MoFEE) has taken important steps, by learning from their neighbours in order to navigate through the complex terrain of programme budgeting. CABRI has seized the opportunity to gain an understanding of Mauritius’ successes, challenges and lessons learned by conducting a Joint Country Case Study.
A CABRI expert group consisting of senior budget officials from Ethiopia (Mr Melaku), Kenya (Mr Kiiru), Rwanda (Mr Baingana and Mr Karakye) and South Africa (Dr Brown) spent a week in February 2010 reviewing the implementation of programme-based budgeting in Mauritius. The review involved an intense schedule of meetings, interviews with Mauritian officials and late night discussions amongst the team. The team was supported by the CABRI secretariat and a short-term consultant.
Mauritius’ concerns about a high level of public debt and an excessive expenditure growth that constrained their fiscal space were the main motivation for introducing programme-based budgeting in 2007. Programme-based budgeting was a way to lay the foundations for modernizing public expenditure management systems, and for improving the efficiency and effectiveness of public spending by systematically linking funding to results and making use of performance information to achieve that linkage.The pace of the reforms has been swift. An indicative programme-based budget was submitted alongside the traditional line-item budget in 2007-08 as a starting point, giving the MoFEE the opportunity to update the systems required for full implementation. Subsequently, a fully-fledged programme-based budget embedded in a three-year MTEF (2008-09 to 2010-11) was implemented in the budget year 2008-09. This formed the basis for appropriation by the National Assembly and replaced the traditional line-item budget.
Some preliminary findings from the review
The review covered the conceptual design of programme-based budgeting, the implementation strategy of Mauritius and the impact of the reforms on the budget process.
Preliminary findings from the review suggest that Mauritius has been successful in initiating a shift in mindset towards a performance-based orientation in the delivery of public services. In addition, buy-in from stakeholders and a better relationship between the budget office and line ministries have resulted from the introduction of programme-based budgeting.
The team noted that while the pace of the introduction of the reform has been impressive, Mauritius is facing issues similar to those in other African countries. Some of the challenges are highlighted below:
- Gaining agreement and understanding on terminology and consistency in its use has been a resource-intensive process. Defining programmes, outputs, outcomes, and the links between inputs and outputs and outputs and outcomes, together with the selection of performance indicators, have been the source of much discussion and debate.
- A comprehensive understanding of how to design and implement a programme budget system has yet to trickle down to programme managers and implementers at the line ministry level. Programme-based budgeting requires a shift to include performance in programme management. This shift can only be achieved with targeted technical training for managers:
"It is important to train budget and planning officers in line ministries for PBB to be implemented successfully at ground level.”
(Mr Melaku, Director of PFM, Ethiopia.)
- Designing strategic plans at line ministry level and clearly defining roles and responsibilities in programme design and implementation are critical: 1) for promoting accountability and 2) for programme-based budgeting to go beyond a simple change in budget presentation.
The team concluded that Mauritius had accomplished a significant array of reforms in a short period of time and should be aware of the risk of reform fatigue in the public sector:
“PBB is a gradual process: Mauritius has achieved a lot in three years and should not overstretch itself.” (Mr Elias Baingana, Director-General Budget, Rwanda.)
A report detailing the findings of the review will be available for discussion at the annual CABRI seminar in May 2010.
Links: PBB Manual and PBB 2007-2008
For further information, please contact Aarti Shah ( This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it ) and Helene Ba ( This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it )
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