LEAP’s GH¢50 million budget inadequate: ISODEC
The Integrated Social Development Centre (ISODEC) has said the GH¢50 million budgeted for the Livelihood Empowerment Against Poverty (LEAP) initiative in 2016 is far below what is needed to cover extreme poor households in Ghana.
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Although allocation to the programme increased by 31.6 per cent in 2016 to GH¢50m, ISODEC analysis showed that about GH¢88 million is needed to cater for beneficiaries of the programme, a Policy Analyst at ISODEC, Mrs Charlotte Esenam Afudego told GRAPHIC BUSINESS.
“The 2016 Budget did not provide detailed information on budgetary allocations to each of the social protection programmes (SPPs). To enable transparency and effective monitoring, future budgets should clearly provide detailed information on budgetary allocations to each programme,” she said.
SSPs
The main interventions being implemented currently include the LEAP, Social Inclusion Transfers (SITs), School Feeding, Take-home Rations for Girls, Free School Uniforms, Free Exercise Books, Programme on Elimination of Child Labour, Education Capitation Grants and Supplementary Grant (GEP).
The rest are the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) Exemptions, Government Subsidy for Senior High Schools (SHS), GETFund Scholarships, Senior Secondary Scholarships and Girls-PASS Scholarships.
The Minister of Finance, Mr Seth Tekper, during the presentation of the 2016 Budget last year, said the government would maintain those programmes as priority areas of spending in 2016.
Mr Terkper also indicated that the government had made provisions for the implementation of a Social Protection Policy (SPP) in the 2016 budget as part of a broader national development strategy to address the extreme poverty and vulnerabilities in the country.
He said the social protection programmes implemented over the years had sought to provide some compatriots with respite from hardships and further equip them to participate in the basic socio-economic activities.
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“Those programmes, however, had not always achieved the expected outcomes due to poor targeting and uncoordinated approach to their delivery,” he said.
ISODEC’s analysis
ISODEC noted that, Ghana’s social sectors which were key to the development of women and children needed to be reviewed within Ghana’s uncompleted agenda for the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and the new Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
According to ISODEC, the low growth of 0.04 per cent recorded for the agricultural sector in 2015, which was largely attributed to the -1.7 per cent growth experienced by the crop sub-sector in 2015, presents a worrying situation, especially when most Ghanaians in rural areas depend on agriculture for food, livelihoods and incomes.
“There is need for the government to increase and focus strategic investment to improve market functioning in productive sectors, particularly in agriculture,” she said.
Education
Mrs Afudego said given the continued challenges faced in the education sector in terms of the quality of outcomes, specifically learning, it would be crucial to undertake a public expenditure review in 2016 so as to better allocate funds to provide vital educational training, equipment and infrastructure.
“The basic education expenditure which is one of the key poverty reduction expenditures declined by 4.3 per cent. This does not augur well for bridging the equity gap in education. The sector needs to be pushed up in terms of investment in the assets and services areas to be able to deliver on the SDG 4 for ensuring quality education,” she said.
Pro-poor activities
Total government spending on pro-poor activities for 2016 is estimated at GH¢8,754.13 million, representing 22.67 per cent of GH¢38,611.44 million total government expenditure.
Out of a total budget for 2015 of GH¢34,402.43 million (which excludes tax expenditures and foreign-financed capital expenditures), an amount of GH¢7,594.34 million, representing 22.08 per cent was earmarked for poverty-reduction activities.
By the end of September 2015, a total of GH¢5,290.87 million had been spent, representing 24.18 per cent of the total government expenditures of GH¢21,884.32 million. GB