Public Expenditure Tracking and Service Delivery Surveys

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Public Expenditure TrackingandService Delivery
Surveys

• Jordan Public Expenditure Review
• June 15, 2003
• Ritva Reinikka
• Development Research Group, The World Bank

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Public Expenditure Tracking and Service Delivery
Surveys

• First Public Expenditure Tracking Survey (PETS)
  carried out in Uganda in 1996
  
• Since then, a large number of PETS and related
  surveys have been implemented
  
• Scope and nature of surveys are differed, but
  common theme is link between public spending and
  outputs and development outcomes

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We generally believe that providing financing and
flexibility to countries with well-designed
policies allows us to leverage good outcomes.
From policies and spending to benefits
Benefits
Government
Outcomes
4
Breakdowns on the way to achieving outcomes are
due to
gaps in
Government

• Policy
• Information/ME
• Capacity
• Household Behaviors
• Institutional Incentives
• Financing
• Other Sectors

Local Gov.
Providers
Individuals
Outcomes
Benefits
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The (missing) link between public spending and
outcomes
Broad allocation of resources
Delays and lack of predictability (e.g.
salaries, medicine stock-outs)
Problems in budget execution
Discretionary reallocation of resources
(favoritism, lack of criteria or information,
etc.)
PUBLIC EXPENDITURE TRACKING AND SERVICE DELIVERY
SURVEYS
Leakage of financial or material resources
Misappropriation of resources (e.g. theft of
medicines)
Problems in service delivery
Absenteeism
Overcharging
Inefficiency, high cost, low quality
Lack of demand for services
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A frameworkfor service deliveryWorld
Development Report 2004
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The Survey Approach

• Approach has varied considerably depending on
  context and focus
  
• Multilevel focus, but frontline providers
  (schools or health facilities) as main unit of
  observation
  
• Representative sample
• Data collected through interviews and record
  reviews (financial records, stock cards for
  medicines, etc.)
  
• Multi-angular approach for validation of data
• Some surveys include detailed surveys of
  frontline provider, including availability/adequac
  y of inputs, quality, staff and user interviews,
  etc.

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What have we learnt? Leakage

• Education sector in Uganda 1996
• Data from 250 schools and administrative units
• Only 13 percent of intended capitation grant
  actually reached schools (1991-95).
  
• Mass information campaign by Ministry of Finance
  (the press, posters)
  
• Follow-up PETS to evaluate impact of the
  information campaign 2/3 of reduction in leakage
  thanks to the campaign
  
• High leakage has also been found in other
  countries (Tanzania, Ghana, Zambia, Peru)

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What have we learnt? Ghost workers and
absenteeism

• Salary payments leak differently
• Different measurement approaches
• PETS with data collection on payroll and staffing
  data (Honduras 2000, Peru 2002, Zambia 2002,
  Mozambique 2002, etc.)
  
• Unannounced visits to schools and health
  facilities (Bangladesh 2002, India 2002, Uganda
  2002)

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What have we learnt? Allocation and budget
execution

• Leakage sometimes difficult to assess due to lack
  of explicit allocations or entitlements
  
• But surveys can shed light on other important
  allocation and budget execution issues
  
• Primary health care in Mozambique
• Very large variation across districts and
  facilities in non-wage recurrent spending,
  staffing, and distribution of medicines
  
• Severe problems in budget execution, with late
  first transfers and slow processing of accounts,
  resulting in low predictability
  
• Weak record keeping at provincial, district, and
  facility levels, often with large discrepancies
  between levels
  
• Why this variation? Corruption may be one factor

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The strengths of the approach

• Useful tool for diagnosing and understanding
  problems in budget execution and service
  delivery, including corruption
  
• Multilevel perspective important and not achieved
  from simple school or facility surveys
  
• District and frontline provider perspective often
  forgotten at central level
  
• Representative sample provides credibility not
  achieved through small-sample studies or
  institutional reviews
  
• Validation of administrative data (financial and
  output)
  
• Can provide basis for monitoring of changes over
  time
  
• Surveys provide data for research that can
  improve our understanding of the determinants of
  corruption or poor service delivery
  
• Process of designing and implementing survey is
  useful for understanding institutional and
  procedural arrangements for budget execution and
  service delivery

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Survey Design Surveying what? Why?

• What are the problems? Are there important gaps
  in our understanding of the nature, extent, and
  source of problems?
  
• Is a survey the appropriate tool? Stand-alone or
  as a complement? Worth the cost?
  
• Is it feasible? How is the budget structured and
  implemented?
  
• Who is the audience and is there a likely impact?
  Is there a political demand?
  
• Will the information be used? By whom?

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Implementation issues Who? How?

• Requires skills like any other micro survey
• Steps in implementation
• Concept
• Buy-in across the board
• Questionnaire design
• Identify (and contract) implementing agency
• Pilot
• Enumerator training
• Field work (including quality control and data
  entry)
  
• Analysis and dissemination

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Some limitations

• Surveys only provide part of the answer
• What about inter- and intra-sectoral allocations?
  
  
• Link with outcomes?
• Budget analysis and social impact analysis
  (with household data or through participatory
  approaches) are still important
  
• Surveys should supplement rather than supplant
  routine information, control, and integrity
  systems
  
• Surveys provide information but dont necessarily
  result in change
  
• A lack of information about the scope and nature
  of problems is not always the primary constraint
  to improving PEM and service delivery
  
• Continuity and link with efforts at strengthening
  institutions and routine PEM systems important
  
• Link with community and other local stakeholders
  can be difficult to achieve important to use
  findings to strengthen local transparency and
  accountability mechanisms

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Finding out more

• Survey reports, instruments, and documentation
  on www.publicspending.org
  
• http//www1.worldbank.org/publicsector/pe/tracking
  surveys.htm
  
• Some references
• Dehn, Reinikka, and Svensson. 2003. Survey Tools
  for Assessing Performance in Service Delivery.
  In Bourguignon and Pereira da Silva, eds.
  Evaluating the Poverty and Distributional Impact
  of Economic Policies. Oxford University Press and
  the World Bank. Forthcoming
• Reinikka and Svensson. 2002. Measuring and
  understanding corruption at the micro level. In
  Della Porta and Rose-Ackerman, eds. Corrupt
  Exchanges Empirical Themes in the Politics and
  Political Economy of Corruption. Nomos
  Verlagsgesellshaft.
• Lindelow and Wagstaff. 2002. Health Facility
  Surveys An Introduction. Policy Research
  Working Paper 2953. The World Bank.
  
• Email rreinikka_at_worldbank.org