(Available also for Customised Training by Duration, Venue & Fee)

What the Course Presents
•    How governments can make a more explicit and consistent statement of policy goals and priorities.
•    Provides continuity to the budget process by placing the annual budget discussion in the context of the government’s medium term fiscal strategy  and policy priorities.
•    Encourages efficiency in the allocation of public resources by enhancing transparency and accountability in the budget process and by providing a mechanism for the systematic review of expenditure priorities and commitments.
•    Budget projections signal whether current policies and their future implications are at odds with this fiscal strategy.
•    Serves as a vehicle for encouraging cooperation between various government agencies by inviting greater involvement of line ministries in the budget process.

Training Objectives
The objective of the training is to expose participants drawn from the Budgeting department of the Planning Ministry as well as Officers responsible for Budget Preparation in all the other Ministries, Departments and Agencies to the principles, practices and current thinking, concepts  and developments on multi year budgeting so as to appreciate the value of the process and enhance their the ability to draw up multi year budgets to  support programmes and projects. It will also provide a better understanding and interpretation of budget reports whilst fostering the savings of time and effort in preparing annual budgets.

Course Contents
DAY ONE
Budgeting Fundamentals
•    What is budget realism?
•    Budget realism
•    Annual and medium-term budgets
•    Budget realism concepts and characteristics

•    The budget system
•    Annual budget cycle
•    Understanding the budget: its coverage
•    Expenditure classifications
•    Key budget processes

DAY TWO
Multi Year Budgeting
•    Overview / introduction to Multi-year budgeting and expenditure programming
•    Medium term and expenditure frame works
•    Multi-year expenditure programming approaches
•    Implementing Multi-year expenditure programming
•    Planning, programming and budgeting system
•    Medium-term budget

DAY THREE
Budget regulation frameworks .
•    'Top-down' planning and budgeting
•    Economic and fiscal update
•    Fiscal strategy paper
•    Budget policy statement
•    'Bottom-up' planning and budgeting
•    Preparing a realistic budget
•    Processes, responsibilities and documents

DAY FOUR
Preparing a budget
•     Planning and preparing the budget
o    Setting up a Budget Planning Committee
o    Budget calendar
o    Preparing the budget
•    Getting legislative approval for the budget
•    Implementing the budget
•    Forecasting and modelling budgets using solver ( a special computer package)
•    Computerized budget management
 
DAY FIVE
Monitoring and Evaluation
•    Tracking and evaluating performance of the budget
•    Public expenditure tracking systems / surveys
•    Recording, auditing and reviewing budget performance
•    Monitoring and evaluating the budget
•    Mainstreaming gender and social inclusion in budget processes