Assessing Government Spending

By Ahmed Mousa Jiyad.

Assessing Government Spending

This is an updated version of the last part (and the list of consulted references) of the research work commissioned by the Natural Resource Governance Institute (NRGI), USA, as part of the preparation for NRGI’s strategic plan for interlinked and complementary interventions in Iraq during the upcoming three years.

• The Executive Summary of the study was posted on this IBN website and accessible through the following link: https://www.iraq-businessnews.com/2015/05/26/expert-blog-iraqi-extractive-industry/;
• Part One was posted on the same IBN website and accessible through the following link: https://www.iraq-businessnews.com/2015/06/09/framework-governing-extractive-industries-in-iraq/;
• Part Two was posted on the same IBN website and accessible through the following link: https://www.iraq-businessnews.com/2015/06/29/oil-revenue-distribution-issues-in-iraq/; and,
• Part Three was posted also on IBN website and accessible through the following link: https://www.iraq-businessnews.com/2015/07/20/managing-volatility-of-oil-export-revenues/

The following main but very broad four questions will be addressed in this part of the study:

1. Does government use Extractive Industry (EI) revenues as an opportunity to increase the efficiency of public spending at the national and sub-national levels?
2. Administrative capacity: Has government strengthened efficiently its capability to invest resource revenues in the domestic economy (i.e. quality of expenditures)?
3. Does government take effective steps to reduce corruption in public spending? Where is corruption in public spending most problematic?
4. Economic absorptive capacity: Does the country face problems absorbing the large public spending associated with oil and gas? If so, what steps have been taken? If not, what are the main problems?

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