Permanent Secretaries, Dep-uty Permanent Secretaries and other financial administrators from various ministries benefitted from discussions centred on strategic planning as a prerequisite for stronger management at a workshop that the Ministry of Finance held yesterday.
The workshop was held at the Bank of Guyana and Minister of Finance Dr. Ashni Singh delivered remarks, according to the Government Information Agency (GINA).
“We regard the development of strategic plans as an indispensable requirement for strengthened management in each of the sectors and in each of the budget agencies…but this is not to be regarded as a stand-alone exercise…this government has over the last decade or so embarked on an ambitious comprehensive plan to strengthen public financial management,” stated Dr. Singh.
The Minister referred to the amendments to Guyana’s Constitution in 2001 which included the establishment of Standing Sectoral Commit-tees in the Parliament that were given, by virtue of the 2001 amendments, a mandate to exercise Parliamentary oversight over various sectors.
He noted that this also set the basis for the next wave of reforms which comprises legislative interventions such as the enactment of a modern budget law – the Fiscal Management and Account-ability Act of 2003, the Procurement Act of 2003 and the Audit Act of 2004.
According to GINA, Minister Singh also expressed his deep satisfaction with the number of senior administrators from within the government who attended the workshop. He noted that their presence is an indication of the level of importance they attach to the subject of the workshop.
“The subject of strategic planning, results based management, medium – term expenditure frameworks, programme performance indicators could not possibly be more topical than it is in today’s environment because emphasis on achievement of outcome and results is the latest thinking in public financial management.
That is the case in the hours of academia and amongst development practitioners and public financial management practitioners, and without a doubt, management for results is the current theme, and current thinking is that one no longer just goes away and manages one’s budget resources without due regard to the relationship with results and what one needs to achieve,” he said.
The Minister explained that now is the time that due regard is paid to the strategic framework within which managers operate, the objectives that are being pursued by the respective agencies and what needs to be done or what strategies need to be implemented in order to achieve those objectives and manage the available resources optimally.
“We operate today in an environment of finite fiscal resources; every day agencies are competing for scarce resources,” Minister Singh said.
GINA said that Dr Frederic Martin of IDEA International, who facilitated the workshop, noted that strategic planning is the starting point of any exercise done by managers, and takes into consideration budgeting issues.
