The project Making Budgets and Aid has been providing technical assistance to the Ministry of Finance (MoF) since 2007 and is regarded by the MoF senior management as critical.
The project has met all its annual targets and 2013 was characterized by substantial achievements from the MoF. Thanks to the support and contributions of the project and other technical assistance projects in MoF, the MoF was praised in the Open Budget Index (OBI) and Public Expenditure and Financial Accountability (PEFA) assessments as well as in July, 2013 Senior Official Meeting (SOM) meeting. The Public Finance Management (PFM) capacity of the MoF has been considerably improved over the years and the MoF is recognized (and has demonstrated) as being able to i) handle more on-budget aid and to ii) successfully implement required PFM reforms with technical support from development partners like UNDP. The latest PEFA assessment published in 2013 acknowledges these major progresses and the MoF scored higher than other fragile and even Middle Income Countries, in terms of public expenditure management capacity.