Assistance to the Ministry of Education and Sports of Lao PDR in improving financial planning systems

Detailed description of project Back

The seventh National Socio-Economic Development Plan (NSEDP) (2011-2015) of the Government of Lao PDRemphasizes the role of education in achieving its goals and identifies three major priorities for the sector:

• Expanding equitable access to education services;
• Improving quality and relevance of education services; and
• Strengthening education sector governance and performance management.

The Ministry of Education and Sport (MoES) developed a 5-year Education Sector Development Plan (ESDP) (2011-2015) in line with these priorities. The ESDP Financing Plan identified the needs for recurrent and investment budgets over the five-year period. In mid-2013, a midterm review of the ESDP was carried with support from various development partners, including EU. The ESDP Financial Model would need to be reviewed and upgraded in view of the forthcoming ESDP 2016-20 process, in order to better cover the specific needs of central departments and provinces.

The objectives of the current assignment are to support this review process and to

• Improve existing financial planning instruments and processes and strengthen linkages between the MoES Department of Planning and Department of Finance;
• Raise the capacity of MoES and Provincial education staff to operate the ESDP Financial Model and the Annual Costed Sector Plans (ACSEP) framework.

Type of services provided

PROMAN provides the services of a Senior Finance Expert and a Senior Financial Planning and Budget Systems Expert Tasks are the following:

• Review the existing ESDP Financial Model and formulate proposals for its upgrading;
• Develop an adapted version for the Provinces;
• Develop a handbook for ESDP Financial Model users, at central and provincial level;
• Review the current budget and budget execution processes leading to a diagrammatic description, including timeline, of the “flow of funds”, from budget development to expenditure acquittal.
• Reviewing the ACSEP framework, taking into account the “flow of funds” process and making recommendations
• Develop data entry and structure
• Revise the ACSEP Guidelines accordingly
• Organizing workshops with MoES, province and district officials to present and discuss the revised ESDP Financial Model and ACSEP framework

PROMAN manages the assignment and provides backstopping and quality control.