CONSULTANCY TO CONDUCT STATE BUDGET ANALYSIS OF KEY SOCIAL SECTORS WITH EQUITY & CHILD LENS

SUMMARY

Title

Consultancy to conduct state budget analysis of key social sectors with equity and child lens.

Purpose

To develop concise and reader-friendly Budget Briefs for FY 2015/16 (incl. trends for the previous five FYs – both budget and actual) for key social sectors (Education, Health, Nutrition, Water & Sanitation, Social Welfare - at national and subnational level), an overall state budget brief and a social spending brief for Zanzibar. In addition, building on this analysis, the consultant will be requested to develop a rapid fiscal space profile of the country.

Timeline

From January (9 weeks)

1. Context and Justification

Translating policy intentions into programmes and services that deliver results for children requires resources – human, technical as well as financial. Removing the barriers that prevent children from accessing core quality services depends on the availability of resources, whether raised through domestic revenues, borrowing or development partners' contributions.

Over the years, Tanzania has made efforts to maintain high levels of government spending in key social sectors. Yet expenditures are insufficient and the distribution of public spending tends to be skewed towards better served regions and districts in the country, thereby accentuating existing regional disparities. To complicate matters, critical dimensions of child well-being such as nutrition, early child development and protection against abuse, HIV prevention, water and sanitation, and social protection have not received the attention they deserve in the government budget preparation process.

Of particular concern is the prospect of a stagnant or declining social-sector budget in the face of Tanzania's limited revenue base and its need to increase investment in infrastructure to spur economic growth, which is putting great pressure on its budget. Given the country's riches in the mining sector (gold, oil and gas exploration), as well as its growing economy that is about to reach middle-income status, it is imperative to help the government ensure that Tanzania's wealth contributes to the enhancement of human capital, as a precondition for sustained and shared growth.

Recognising that the State Budget is a critical tool for the realization of children's rights and to address poverty and disparities in the country (around 27% of children live in households which are monetarily poor, and as many as 74% of children experience non-monetary poverty), UNICEF Tanzania, as part of its work on Public Finance for Children (PF4C), has been engaging in budget analysis and advocacy for adequate and equitable resource allocation for social sectors which are crucial for children. In this regard, guidelines based on the recently completed Child Protection Public Expenditure Identification Survey are being implemented to provide guidance to LGAs on how to come in line with approved laws and policies by funding specific activities for child protection. UNICEF also supports comprehensive sector public expenditure reviews (PERs), such as the PER for nutrition completed in 2014 to support the implementation of the government's commitment to increase the resources for critical interventions targeting malnourished mothers and their children.

UNICEF also contributes to the Rapid Budget Analysis (RBA), which is an annual exercise led by the World Bank in collaboration with the Government of Tanzania (GoT). The objective of the RBA is to review actual and budgeted expenditure patterns to inform strategic resource allocation and thereby make recommendations to accelerate economic growth and poverty reduction. The RBA currently covers: Agriculture, Transport, Water, Education, Health (incl. HIV/AIDS), Energy, as well as allocations to the Local Govenment Authorities (LGAs). The analysis intends to inform sector reviews, input into the budget preparation through the Planning and Budget Guidelines, inform the MTEF, and ensure a better link between the budget and key GoT priorities.

However, as this exercise mostly involves the central Government and key development partners, there is a missed opportunity in terms of sharing the wealth of critical information and analysis that is being produced with the broader development community, civil society, local government, as well as the general public. Also, important social sectors, as well as Zanzibar, are not covered by the current analysis. In this context, UNICEF in collaboration with the Government, the WB and other key development partners, intends to support and build on the current RBA exercise by producing concise and reader-friendly Budget Briefs for key social sectors based on the RBA analysis, as well as filling in some critical gaps of the current RBA exercise.

2. Purpose and key objectives

Working closely with a national consultant, the hired international consultant will develop equity focused Budget Briefs for 2015/16, short and reader-friendly analyses of the State Budget 2015/16, expenditure outturn for 2014/15, and trends over time (previous five years), building on the RBA analysis. These briefs intends to be used as important information and advocacy aimed at expanding the debate around social sector budget and thereby influencing a more pro-poor, transparent, participatory and equitable public spending in the country across regions and districts. They will cover key social areas such as: Education, Health, Nutrition, Water & Sanitation, Social Welfare (at national and subnational level). There will also be a generic brief looking at the overall state budget and its composition, as well as a social spending brief for Zanzibar. In addition, building on the said analysis, the consultants will be requested to develop a fiscal space profile of the country in order to analyse current and future sources of social spending.

These briefs will be shared with Government representatives, members of the Parliament, Development Partners, Academia, Civil Society among others, with the intent of sparking broad public interest and debate around the State Budget and how resources are distributed among social sectors. Specifically, the proposed briefs on key social sectors that impact children's and women's well-being in both Mainland and Zanzibar have the following two key goals:

Ø To inform the Government at both national and sub-national level, Parliament, broad development community, civil society and general public, serving as a tool for increased understanding and advocacy on budget allocation and expenditure for social sectors - In synergy with the RBA exercise, the analysis will include a definition of the sector; provide an overview of the sector budget and sources of funding; assess sector budget allocation (versus experditure outturn) over time (including percentage of GDP and comparison across regions/districts); assess consistency between sector budget allocations and sector priority objectives (as defined by MKUKUTA, FYDP, sector SPs, BRN and other relevant sector documents); and provide an analysis of the sector decentralised budget from an equity perspective. In the case of Zanzibar, an analysis will be carried out to analyse spending in key social sectors as per above. This composition of expenditure's analysis is particularly timely as a new Parliament and Govenrment will be in place by the end of 2015.

Ø To inform UNICEF advocacy and programmatic efforts via a strengthened evidence base on allocation and expenditure trends in specific social sectors - The objective of this analysis is to inform UNICEF on the spending for sectors that most directly impact the lives of children, highlighting areas that need to be pushed for and strengthened. The analysis should focus on: the weight of the social sectors in the State budget, percentage of the GDP, trends in the allocation to, and expenditure of, the sectors (looking at at least the last five years), sources of funds (internal versus external), an analysis of per capita allocation by region/district, and allocation versus poverty levels and key child outcomes (equity analysis). This analysis is particularly timely as UNICEF (and the broader UN via Delivering as One) is identifying key priorities for its next five-year plan. In addition, the fiscal space profile will be used as a basis for determining engagement and advocacy in PF4C work, including tax reforms, and for broader leveraging of domestic resources.

3. Methodology and Approach

The budget briefs are a result of an in-depth desk review analysis that includes reading and mining on key Public Finance Management (PFM) documents, statistical and sector strategies documents, including: budget books; budget laws; state budget reports; citizens budget; Medium Terms Expenditure Frameworks (MTEF); General State Accounts; Government long- and medium-term development plans; sector strategic plans; relevant national surveys, and other useful documents. Each brief will cover one sector, providing clear and concise analysis, and identifying key highlights. There will also be a generic brief looking at the overall budget and its composition, as well as one specific on Zanzibar.

It is planned that an international consultant (individual or institution) will be working closely with a national consultant, preferably a local institution/organisation to ensure ownership and capacity building in order for the exercise to become entirely led by a national institution/organization in the short term. Collaboration with local institutions/organisations will also be sought by UNICEF to develop and implement a solid communication and dissemination plan to ensure that the target groups are reached and engaged effectively.

4. Activities and Tasks

The international consultant will work closely with the national consultant to:

• Review all PFM instruments in Tanzania (both Mainland and Zanzibar) and key strategies and plans, including sector-specific strategies.
• Build on the RBA and conduct further analysis of the State Budget and Expenditure Outturn (for current and previous five FYs) to ensure key social sectors are analyzed (as per above) in both Mainland and Zanzibar. Specifically:
• Develop a budget brief template to be discussed and approved;
• Provide a list of source data;
• Propose a detailed methodology to develop the briefs;
• Fill in the template as per output 1 (section 5);
• Present results in word version with illustrative figures (graphs, tables, maps) – a proper layout will be done by UNICEF later on.
• Produce a fiscal space profile of the country as described in section 2.
• Support the development of a communication and dissemination plan for the Budget Briefs.

In addition to the above, the international consultant will be required to:

· Strengthen capacity of the national consultant and key national partners/stakeholders involved in view of ensuring a progressive 'nationalisation' of the exercise.

5. Deliverables and Management

This Consultancy will have the following outputs:

a) Output 1: Series of Budget Briefs (4 pages maximum per brief) for Overall State Budget, Education, Health, Nutrition, Water & Sanitation, Social Welfare, and Zanzibar with key messages and complete dataset used;

b) Output 2: Fiscal Space Profile with key recommendations.

Products will be delivered in English and will be later translated into Swahili by UNICEF. All deliverables should be accompanied by the excel file with all used datasets (including raw data, graphs, maps etc), and PowerPoint presentations with the most important findings and key messages from each brief, as well as an overall presentation on social spending in Tanzania. A detailed workplan and timeline will be requested at the beginning of the assignment. The consultants are expected to operate in close synergy with a working group inclusive of key partners (UNICEF, MoF, WB and relevant NGOs), which will be established at the beginning of the exercise.

6. Qualifications

The international consultant should have:

· A solid knowledge of PFM instruments, and proven experience (at least 8 years) on similar analyses of the State Budget with focus on social sectors;

· Strong analytical and writing skills, and the ability to present the results in a simple language, making use of interesting visual aid (maps, graphs and other visual tools);

· Consolidated knowledge and foundation on crosscutting themes such as equity and sectoral decentralization;

· An advanced University Degree in Economics, Public Policy, Governance or other relevant areas;

· Full computer literacy, incl. an advanced knowledge of excel;

· High proficiency in English;

· Excellent capacity building skills and previous training experience (at least 3 years);

· Ability to complete the task in a tight schedule and with limited supervision.

HOW TO APPLY:

Qualified candidates are requested to submit a cover letter, CV and a signed P11 form (which can be downloaded at http://www.unicef.org/about/employ/index_53129.html) to hr.tanzania@unicef.org with subject line Consultancy Vacancy Number 2015-16 on or before the closing date of 30 November 2015.

Interested consultants to indicate ability, availability and rate (daily/ monthly) to undertake the terms of reference.

Applications submitted without a fee/ rate will not be considered.

Qualified Female Candidates are encouraged to apply

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