Ghana has developed its Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) Budget Report to show that financing for the SDGs are being tracked in tandem with the tenets of the Addis Ababa Action Agenda (AAAA) for implementing the SDGs.
Ghana is the second country after Mexico to produce this report, the primary objective of which is to ensure a more effective tracking of Ghana’s performance on the SDGs.
The Report is the starting point of a bi-annual series of SDG Budget Reports on allocation and actual spending to ensure that time and resources are channelled towards the 2030 deadline for meeting the SDGs.
The SDG Baseline Report is based on a comprehensive analysis of how the coding of the policy objective segment of the chart of accounts could better track SDG budget allocations and serves as an annual performance wheel to ensure implementation of the SDGs in the Budget.
Ghana’s SDG Budget Report 2018, has, however, called for a re-coding of the budget system from policy objectives to SDG targets to enable the tracking of all allocations to the SDGS.
In an address to launch the Report in Accra, yesterday, July 15, 2018, Mr Ken Ofori-Atta, Minister for Finance, said the Ministry of Finance (MoF), as a central Finance Agency, had a responsibility to ensure that its four-fold functions– Mobilization, Allocation, Disbursement and Accounting for funds were Agenda 2030 compliant.
This, Mr Ofori-Atta said, meant that MoF should ensure that the key outputs of the Budget Statement and Economic Policy were all linked to the SDGs targets and indicators.
The Finance Minister said with this proactive SDG Budget Report, Ghana was taking the lead in developing a national structure and methodology for tracking budget within the SDGs framework.
He noted that although this first Report did not give a full picture of the 2018 SDG Budget Allocation, a lot of work had been put into developing a template for how future budgets would be presented as tools for meeting the SDGs, adding that the 2019 Budget would reflect the SDGs within the Ghana Integrated Management Information System (GIFMIS).
Mr Ofori-Atta gave the assurance that many of the SDGs would be achieved with inclusive policies and improved implementation practices.
However, he said, more collaboration among public institutions, the private sector, learning communities and civil society would be required.
He disclosed that government would launch the Accra SDG Investment Fair as a new marketplace for SDG investment and as an opportunity for local and global partnerships on financing the SGDs in Ghana.
In a presentation, Mrs Gladys Ghartey, Head, United Nations Systems Unit in Ghana and Focal Person on SDGs, said the SDGs were about the People, Planet, Prosperity, Peace and Partnership (The 5Ps), adding that for Ghana, a sixth ‘P’, representing political will, had been added.
Mr Michael Ayesu Acting Chief Director, MoF, described the Report as a bold attempt at implementing the SDGs and urged institutions to design and implement programmes that would enable Ghana to achieve the goals of Agenda 2030.
On September 25, 2015, more than 150 world leaders adopted the Post-2015 Global Development Framework–The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development (2016-2030), comprising 17 goals and 169 targets.
The 2030 Agenda is expected to address the three interconnected elements of sustainable development, economic growth, social inclusion and environmental sustainability.
The 2030 Agenda also requires a comprehensive approach, which mobilizes public finance, sets appropriate policies and regulatory frameworks, unlocks the transformative potential of people and the private sector, and incentivises changes in the consumption, production and investment in support of sustainable development–all of which are contained in the Means of Implementation, the AAAA.
Source: allAfrica
