Invitation to Participate in WB Public Sector Pay Survey

Posted by Bill Dorotinsky

The World Bank's Latin America and Caribbean (LAC) Region public sector group is inviting interested parties to participate in a brief on-line survey on public sector pay. The small and purely indicative survey is on the implicit principles behind pay setting in the public sector - and the implications for those private sector institutions that are now receiving significant public sector funding because of the crisis.

The background is that since the last quarter of 2008, governments across the OECD have responded dramatically to the financial crisis: some $500 billion was invested in the financial systems of developed countries by the end of 2008. The Emergency Economic Stabilization Act in the USA, the UK Government’s credit guarantee scheme, and similar developments elsewhere have turned governments into the effective owner of a number of banks, brokerages, and even insurance firms.

There are some signs that public sector pay-setting principles are beginning to apply to subsidized private sector entities.  In the US, on February 4 new compensation rules were issued to cap the pay of senior executives at firms that receive significant rescue funds through the Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP). (See www.worldbank.org/lacpublicsector for further details in English, or http://go.worldbank.org/A3XRERDLV0 for details in Spanish.)

The World Bank LAC region may be issuing a longer working paper on this topic - if these indicative survey results do provide a justification for asserting that there are indeed some principles at work here.

Interested participants should complete the brief survey by April 17, 2009.

The English language on-line survey is at: https://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=xS20H_2fC9_2bVkbspoOz3yYDg_3d_3d.

The Spanish language version is at:  https://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=v_2bCTjgKu5JByJybmQjY8Wg_3d_3d

For further details, contact Nick Manning, Sector Manager, LAC public sector, The World Bank at nmanning@worldbank.org

ANNUALITÉ BUDGÉTAIRE ET PERIODE COMPLÉMENTAIRE dans l’environnement du droit des finances publiques français

Par Dominique Bouley.

Il existe dans le droit budgétaire un instrument original pour exécuter le budget, en dépassant le cadre annuel tout en respectant le principe de l’annualité budgétaire. Il se présente sous des formes variées avec des appellations diverses : [1] journée complémentaire, période complémentaire, délai complémentaire. Cet instrument peut avoir des répercussions ou non sur la trésorerie. Si cette réglementation en France remontant à presque 200 ans, était claire et précise, il est constaté que son usage dans les pays utilisant les règles de finances publiques francophones issues de la législation française est devenu plus incertain et la notion de période complémentaire a changé de champ et d’importance dans le cadre de l’exécution budgétaire.

BUDGET ANNUALITY AND THE COMPLEMENTARY PERIOD in the French public finance law environment

Posted by Dominique Bouley

In budget law there is an original instrument for executing the budget by working around the annual framework while observing the principle of budget annuality. It takes various forms with different name¹: complementary day, complementary period, complementary lag. This instrument may or may not have repercussions on cash flow. While this regulation in France dates back almost 200 years, and was clear and precise, it has been observed that its usage in those countries that use the public finance rules of French-speaking countries derived from French legislation has become less controlled and that the concept of complementary period has changed in scope and importance in the context of budget execution.

PEFA Enters A New Phase

From the PEFA Newsletter - February 2009

By Brandon Lundberg and Frans E. Ronsholt. 

The PEFA Steering Committee met in Brussels on December 17th and 18th for its regular semi-annual meeting, with the European Commission in the rotating chair. This occasion marked the transition into a third phase of the program, which has been under preparation throughout 2008. Phase III is for a duration of three years starting January 1st 2009.

Are countries strengthening public financial management to meet the financial and economic crises?

Posted by Eivind Tandberg.

A recent post by Mario Pessoa (PFM blog March 9) described how the US government is making efforts to strengthen budget management and public financial management in light of the ongoing financial and economic crisis. Key measures include expanded medium-term fiscal projections, a tougher expenditure review process to eliminate programs that are not working well, the inclusion of a contingent fund for emergencies, a more transparent approach regarding earmarks and results, a more result-oriented strategy in relation to the definition of the programs, and a clear commitment to using technology to enhance budget efficiency and transparency.

Fiscal Risks: Sources, Disclosure and Management

Posted by Eivind Tandberg

A recent FAD paper (Download FAD fiscal risks paper) summarizes work FAD staff have been doing on fiscal risks over the last few years. Some of this work has already been reported on this blog, but this is the most recent comprehensive publication on the topic. The paper, by Aliona Cebotari, Jeffrey Davis, Lusine Lusinyan, Amine Mati, Paulo Mauro, Murray Petrie and Ricardo Velloso, discusses sources of fiscal risk and international experiences in disclosure and management of such risks, and draws lessons on the basis of these experiences and FAD analysis.

Accrual Accounting for the Public Sector - a fad that has had its day?

By Andy Wynne, andywynne@lineone.net

The latest issue of the International Journal of Governmental Financial Management (www.icgfm.org/digest.htm) contains a useful review of the experience of implementing accrual accounting by central governments.  Its findings should increase the number of governments which have considered this approach, but have decided that other reforms are more important and are more likely to deliver significant benefits.

Performance Budgeting Equals Soviet-style Central Planning?

Posted by Eivind Tandberg.

A common criticism of performance and program budgeting efforts is that they lead to budget planning systems that are mechanistic, overly complex, and overloaded with useless data; and that performance data have little or no impact on actual decisions. Many critics compare performance-oriented budget mechanisms to the planning models developed by Soviet central planners, and claim they are equally useful (or useless). Is there any truth to this claim? This blog provides a brief discussion of the claim in relation to three specific dimensions of performance budgeting: the historical roots, the concepts and the practical implementation of these concepts.

Finding Credible Information About Public-Private Partnerships

Posted by Eivind Tandberg.

 

Many countries pursue public-private partnerships (PPP) as a mechanism to enhance the efficiency of public spending and to broaden the financing options for public services. For many transition and developing countries, the PPP concept is still new, and many countries do not yet have any PPP projects in operation. There is emerging awareness of the risks and potential benefits of PPPs, but countries often find it difficult to fully assess these aspects when developing PPP projects.

 

There is considerable demand for information about PPPs, and a number of information resources are available. However, much of the information is provided by entities that have strong interests in promoting PPPs, such as national PPP agencies, legal firms and financial market participants. It is often difficult to find objective and neutral information. This post suggests a few sources that contain interesting materials, but does not pertain to be exhaustive. There are obviously many other reliable and valuable sources in this sector.

Advanced PFM Reforms in South East Europe

Posted by Eivind Tandberg.

A forthcoming IMF working paper by Eivind Tandberg and Mia Pavesic-Skerlep aims to clarify possible systemic bottlenecks to the introduction of advanced PFM reforms in the South East European (SEE) countries and propose measures to overcome these obstacles. The draft paper is available at (http://www.cef-see.org/index.php?location=1142).

U.S. Federal Government 2010 Budget Proposal: A More Transparent and Result-Oriented Budget

Posted by Mario Pessoa.

The United States federal government has announced its budget proposal for the next fiscal year 2010 with relevant improvements. Some initiatives are in line with best international practices and other are even more demanding such as an expanded medium-term fiscal projection and program costs with a ten-year perspective, a tougher expenditure review process to eliminate programs that are not working well, the inclusion of a contingent fund for emergencies, a more transparent approach regarding earmarks and results, a more result-oriented strategy in relation to the definition of the programs, and a clear commitment to a more intense use of technology as a tool to enhance efficiency and transparency.

GAO revised the Federal Information System Controls Audit Manual (FISCAM)

Posted by Mario Pessoa.

Availability of timely and reliable fiscal information is an essential element of a good public financial management system. Because of that countries are investing intensively in information technology. However, an important question keeps occupying manager’s minds: are the information systems reliable? To answer this question with chirurgical precision you need an information control audit that is able to appraise elements such as security management, access controls, configuration management, segregation of duties and contingent planning.

Comptabilité budgétaire

Par Benoît Chevauchez.

La « comptabilité budgétaire » est une forme courante de comptabilité publique et, pourtant, le manuel GFS- « bible » des comptables et statisticiens des budgets publics- n’en parle pas…

Budgetary Accounting

By Benoît Chevauchez.

“Budgetary accounting” is a common form of public accounting and yet the Government Finance Statistics Manual, which accountants and statisticians regard as their “bible,” has nothing to say on the subject.

Andre Terrrot's English-French Public Financial Management Glossary

Posted by Dominique Bouley

 

In a February 6, 2009 PFM blog post titled "Confounded by Language," my colleague Holger van Eden showed some of the pitfalls of lousy interpretation. as he pointed out, this can lead to sometimes embarassing or funny situations. Well, translation of PFM terms is not much better in that respect.

Finding the exact translation of a PFM technical concept can be very tricky. It is difficult enough for the concepts which are used in the two countries whose languages are the source and the target for translation. It becomes extremely tricky when the PFM concept is specific to a PFM system and does not really have a direct equivalent in the target language.

Over the years, my former colleague and dear friend André Terrot, who was a senior reviewer in the then bureau of language services of the IMF faced many of these situations. As a result, he became one of the world's best experts in translating English PFM terminology into French.

Soon before retiring a few years ago, André very wisely thought of putting his acquired knowledge on paper and asked for my help in preparing an English-French PFM Glossary. This glossary was unfortunately never published. The PFM blog offers a unique opportunity for sharing this knowledge with everyone. So, for the benefit of our PFM Blog readers, here is a downloadable copy of the Terrot PFM Glossary.

Terrot PFM Glossary (part 1): Download English-French PFM Glossary (part 1)

Terro PFM Glossary (part 2): Download English-French PFM Glossary (part 2)

Of course, translation is an art not a science. PFM readers may have ideas for further improving translation of a word or concept. I would like to invite them to leave their suggestions as comments to this post.