UNDP Poverty Report 2000

Burkina Faso Country Assessment

Seeking Debt Relief to Increase Social Spending

Burkina Faso is among the poorest countries in the world. According to its national definition of poverty, 45% of its population is poor. But unlike so many other countries in Sub-Saharan Africa, it does not have a stand-alone poverty reduction strategy or programme. A major problem is its onerous external debt burden. Before it can make any progress against poverty, it badly needs debt relief.

Rather than an explicit anti-poverty plan, the government has incorporated into its national development policy various programmes - mostly in basic social services - that contain projects to improve the well-being of the poor and set targets to do so.

The Letter of Intention for a Policy on Sustainable Human Development formulates the country's national development policy for 1995 - 2005. To provide every citizen access to economic, food, health, environmental and personal security, it has set three quantitative targets: a minimum increase in GDP per person of 3% a year, a doubling of the literacy rate from the current 22% and a gain in life expectancy of 10 years from 52 years today.

The government's main anti-poverty policy is to increase the share of public resources allocated to the social sectors, understandable given the country's extremely low human development. In 1997 Burkina Faso ranked 171st among 174 countries according to the human development index and recorded a human poverty index of 58%.

A New 20/20 Study

To examine the effectiveness of its budgetary allocations, the government has undertaken several studies with assistance from UNDP, UNICEF and the African Development Bank. One study, in the context of the 20/ 20 Initiative, examined budgetary allocations to social sectors in 1990–97. It also looked for ways to reallocate funds to basic social services and improve the efficiency and efficacy of social spending.

The study concluded that 18% of the government's budget went to basic social services, 27% to all social sectors. But the study found that meeting the government's objective of raising the budget share for social sectors to 40% by 2005 - to respond to the enormous needs of these sectors - was not possible through reallocations alone. During 1995 - 97 the government had reduced the defence budget by a billion CFA francs a year and cut the allocations to higher education by 5% a year.

The Debt Burden

The government had few options for increasing spending on the social sectors because of its heavy external debt. In 1995 - 97 its total external debt was 423% of exports. Worse, its export earnings shrank an average 16% a year in 1990–96.

In 1990 - 97, 31% of the country's export earnings were allocated to servicing debt. In addition, the 20/20 study found that, except for 1997, the share of the government's budget allocated to debt service was sub-stantially higher than that allocated to basic social services (see table).

A New Monitoring System

A positive outcome of the government study has been the setting up of a monitoring system for programmes to be undertaken as part of the 20/ 20 Initiative. The evaluation and monitoring of all relevant programmes are to be coordinated by a committee comprising officials from the Ministries of Health, Education and Water and the Environment. In addition to coordinating monitoring, this committee will recommend measures to improve the effectiveness of public expenditures.

The weakness of Burkina Faso's approach is its tendency to identify poverty as a problem for social policy to resolve. The government does not give poverty reduction a high priority in its national development agenda. Nor does it have a coherent multisectoral poverty strategy or an influential administrative agency to coordinate its implementation.