Govt asks local bodies to formulate participatory budget

Kathmandu, Jun 10

The federal government has requested the local bodies to apply participatory budget formulation strategy amidst the COVID-19 crisis.

“If the current practices of conducting the village or community level meetings seem risky in terms of health safety, apply alternative methods,” the Ministry of Federal Affairs and General Administration said in a recent circular to the local bodies.

It suggested organising multiple small community meetings adhering to the standards of physical distancing, mobilising community organisations to collect the suggestions from people or use information and communication technology method.

It has requested the local bodies to allocate budget to make the service of local government, ward offices and thematic units technology-friendly.

According to the circular, the focus of the local government’s policy and programmes and budget for the coming fiscal year should be on the operation and management of quarantine, distribution of relief, awareness campaign, and data collection and dissemination. For it, there should be a robust assessment of the present and future impact of the pandemic.

“Give priority to the incomplete projects of the current fiscal year and multi-year projects. Likewise, priority should be accorded to the projects that create employment and use local raw materials, skill and technology,” read the document.

It has suggested to design programmes that can create employment to the deprived sector workers and provide relief to the disabled, senior citizens, and pregnant women.

The Federal Government has also asked the sub-national bodies to provide concessions to the business and industry sectors affected by the COVID-19 pandemic, and make the estimates of income more realistic with sound assessment of its impact on the tax and non-tax revenue.

Since there could be chances of fluctuation in the internal income, inter-governmental fund transfer, revenue distribution and royalties, the budget should be designed with enough flexibility.

In terms of health programmes, local governments are urged to allocate enough budget so that the health workers and other human resources mobilised in the respective local bodies do not have shortage of safety materials like masks, sanitiser, gloves and personal protection equipment.

They are also advised to allocate budget for the awareness programme on prevention and control of the coronavirus and keep ambulance and fire services ready round the clock.

Skill-development training to promote micro and cottage enterprises based on local raw materials and find markets for them, disaster preparedness, livelihood programmes and self-employment for returnee migrant workers should also get attention while devising the budget for the next fiscal.

Local bodies are also suggested managing budget for entrepreneurship promotion, attain self-reliance in agriculture produce, their processing, storage, and market management. Promotion of agriculture and livestock insurance and utilisation of barren land could be other important areas.

Published in The Rising Nepal daily on 11 June 2020.