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June 2006
ISSUE No. 1
PUBLISHER
Zimbabwe SusWatch Network
EDITORIAL TEAM
Sherpard Zvigadza
Simon Ngena
Melanie Mostert
ABOUT
MDGs e-Monitor
The MDGs e-Monitor is devoted to critical analysis and discussion of the
Millennium Development Goals, with particular emphasis on Goals 1, 7 and 8.
It also links the reader to other useful electronic and print resources by
CSOs and Media locally, regionally and internationally so as to stimulate
debate on developmental issues.
REPRODUCTION OF ARTICLES
Readers are welcome to reproduce, in part or in full,
any sections of this newsletter. When reproducing or re-transmitting content,
please credit sources and authors. The content of this newsletter can be
translated into another language and reproduced in other publications, as
long as acknowledgment is made to the Zimbabwe Sustainability Watch Network.
CONTACT US
158 Fife Avenue
P.O. Box 5338
Harare
Zimbabwe
Tel: +263-700030/706998
Fax:+263-700030/706998
E-mail: shepard@zeroregional.com
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WELCOME!!
Welcome to
the first edition of the electronic SusWatch Newsletter! , the MDGs e-Monitor
Newsletter. The Newsletter will be published every quarter and devoted to
critical analysis and discussion of the Millennium Development Goals, with
particular emphasis on Goals 1, 7 and 8.
But this does
not mean the door will be shut to other pertinent issues such as health,
education, gender, education and other issues with a bearing on the
achievement of the MDGs. To this end, the MDGs e-Monitor Newsletter welcomes
the exchange of ideas and experiences from all disciplines and viewpoints and
from different stakeholders ranging from civil society, policymakers, UN
agencies and grassroots communities.
It also aims
at complementing government's efforts towards meeting the MDGs by commenting
on various policy issues that are likely to impact on MDGs attainment.
Stakeholders
wishing to take part in this dialogue are invited to comment on articles
published in the newsletter and contribute articles for possible publication.
They can do so by contacting the publishers at shepard@zeroregional.org.
MILLENNIUM
DEVELOPMENT GOALS NEWS FROM ZIMBABWE
Budget
Monitoring and the Millennium Development Goals
By S. Ngena-SusWatch Media
Forum
Government expenditure
hinges on the National Budget, which is often complemented by a Supplementary
Budget when ministries exceed their budgetary allocations.
How much a government spends,
say, on the construction of roads, clinics or other infrastructure depends to
a large extent on the resources allocated to the various ministries. Like
most countries, the bulk of Zimbabwe's revenue comes from taxation, which
contributes nearly 95% to State coffers.
The tax base is made up
of Value Added Tax, corporate tax, capital gains tax, presumptive tax,
withholding tax, customs and excise duties, etc. In the absence of
multilateral and bilateral aid, these taxes will contribute significantly in
financing the Millennium Development Goals.
A product of an
unprecedented global insight and commitment to address pervasive global
challenges, the MDGs aim to achieve the following targets by 2015:
- Eradicate extreme poverty and
hunger;
- Achieve universal primary
education;
- Promote gender equality and
empower women;
- Reduce child mortality;
- Improve maternal health;
- Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria and
other diseases;
- Ensure environmental
sustainability; and
- Develop a global partnership
for development.
The Government of
Zimbabwe is aware of the mammoth task ahead, but it has committed itself to
meeting the MDGs, first and foremost, from its own resources. "However,
should international relations improve, the external flow of resources
(grants and external borrowing) will go a long way to soften pressures on
domestic resources," notes the 2004 National MDG Progress Report.
Although a commendable
attempt has been made to cost the MDGs, it is not feasible, especially in
Zimbabwe's hyperinflationary environment, to formulate a separate budget for
the achievement of MDGs. Even in the most stable of economies, the MDGs
timeframe alone makes it well nigh impossible to have a budget specifically
for the MDGs. This means, to all intents and purposes, that the cost of
financing the MDGs must be built into a country's national budget.
It is against this
background that the Zimbabwe Sustainability Watch Network held a two-day
training workshop from May 30-31 2006 to demystify the budget and transform
it into a powerful tool for holding governments accountable for the
achievement of the MDGs.
It was observed in the
workshop that it was not enough to monitor national budgets alone. Local
authorities' budgets should also be subject to the same scrutiny. This was
because local authorities were the first port of call for essential services
such as water and sanitation, health care and education. The primary aim of
the Budget monitoring was to critically assess how ministries are
implementing the programmes for which they were allocated funds; and to
provide early warning of budget overruns.
The quarterly review also
provides a useful opportunity to seek explanations from the relevant ministry
for either under-expenditure or over-expenditure. Under-expenditure was not
necessarily a positive thing, particularly where large capital outlays were
involved as the price could be a budget overrun later in the year when
inflation takes its toll, it was observed.
The workshop attracted
Civil Society, United Nations and Government Officials and the Media. In the
coming weeks some of the participants will formulate a dedicated Budget
monitoring team comprising CSOs and Media who will eventually work on a
Universal National Budget Monitoring tool Kit for MDGs . “Hopefully the team
will be in a position to meet with the Parliamentary Portfolio Committees for
their input to influence the budgeting processes”, said Sherpard Zvigadza,
the SusWatch national Focal point.-end
 Zimbabwe Sustainability Watch Network holds workshop:
6-7 December, 2005, UNESCO Conference Hall.
by Sherpard Zvigadza
- Zimbabwe SusWatch National Focal Point
The Sustainability Watch
workshop was held on 6-7 December, 2005 at the UNESCO Conference Hall in
Harare. The workshop attracted 25 participants drawn from a wide
cross-section of civil society organisations active in gender issues,
HIV/AIDS, environment, trade and debt, advocacy, human rights and
development. Also represented were officials from Government, UNDP and the
print media. Specifically, the workshop sought, among other things, to
appraise participants on the SusWatch Project and to design future strategies
through various instruments such as media campaigns, budget monitoring and
partnership building.
A total of four papers
were presented on the following topics:
- Background to the
Sustainability Watch Project (SusWatch NFP)
- The Role of the UNDP in the
MDG Process (UNDP)
- The MDGs: A Government
Perspective (Ministry of Public Service, Labour and Social welfare)
- Budget Tracking as an MDG
Monitoring Tool (Consultant)
Keeping networks
together has not always been an easy task the world over, and Zimbabwe is no
exception. This, without a doubt, will be one of the biggest challenges
facing SusWatch in the years ahead. However, a positive outcome of the
workshop was that participants demonstrated their commitment by openly
critiquing the existing structure and offering suggestions for improvement.
The need for a robust
institutional framework, mapping exercise, a database of civil society
projects and a clearly defined reporting structure was emphasised.
The other strategy
identified for CSOs is that media, private sector and civil society should
establish partnerships with universities to boost their research capacity.
Media practitioners should be co-opted into the SusWatch taskforce rather
than being invited to report on issues, when the need arises.
It is clear that for
Zimbabwe attaining the MDGs is an important challenge, one that can only be
tackled through open dialogue and increased collaboration between citizens,
civil society practitioners, multilateral representatives, government
officials (including local), parliamentarians, representatives from the
business community and the labour sector, indigenous peoples, academia as
well as media practitioners.
Hence, the relations
between Government and civil society should be cooperative rather than
adversarial. Together we can "score" the Goals!!
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SusWatch Zimbabwe Network
Gets Down to Business
by John Chimunhu -
Suswatch Media Forum
The SusWatch Zimbabwe
Network has revamped its activities by approving a formal organisational
structure, adopting its Terms of eference and setting up a media forum to
raise its public profile.
During a workshop held at
the UNESCO Conference Centre on 9 March 2006, task force members mandated
goal leads to look into the draft Terms of Reference and formalise the
media's position in the SusWatch structure.
At a subsequent meeting
held at the ZERO offices on 16 March 2006, the goal leads amended and
approved the Terms of Reference. They also deliberated on the setting up of a
media forum. This would have a cross-cutting role and would participate in
meetings and activities of the working group.
The forum was tasked to
draft a media strategy to raise awareness about the work of SusWatch and the
three MDGs (1,7 and 8) specifically. Forum members also agreed to provide
articles for the SusWatch newsletter. Sherpard Zvigadza the SusWatch NFP
informed members that he had designed a local version of the SusWatch newsletter
and was just waiting for input from members.
It was also agreed that
goal leads would work out details of the activities outlined in the 2006
SusWatch work plan and come up with ractical ideas on how to implement them.
The goal leads are as
follows:
- Goal 1 : Practical Action and
Environment Africa
- Goal 7 : Wildlife
Environmenment Zimbabwe and SARDC-IMERCSA
- Goal 8 : ZIMCODD
The meeting was chaired
by Charlene Hewat and was attended by all the goal leads and media
representatives.
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Zimbabwe
Civil Society, NGOs Probe Official MDG Report
Report by John
Chimunhu - Zimbabwe SusWatch Media Forum
 Zimbabwe has made some progress
towards attaining the United Nations sponsored Millennium Development Goals
but a lot more needs to be done if targets are to be met by 2015, SusWatch
says.
In a 29 page report
(National SusWatch Report) critiquing the government's official MDG report
published in 2004 and launched in September 2005, SusWatch highlights some glaring
shortcomings in the state's presentation. According to SusWatch, the official
MDG report paints a rosy picture which is quite possibly misleading.
"This assessment
does not seem to be supported by evidence on the ground. The absence of
updated data on key indicators on poverty, environment and health are of
major concern. Even in those areas where data was collected, capacity to
analyse and timely produce reports is very weak", the SusWatch report
says. However, after the Summit the Government embarked on reviewing the 2004
report in question and a draft 2005 report is being finalised. However, the
process indicated that not all CSOs participated, but the fact that some
participated is a clear indication by CSOs to complement government's efforts
towards sustainable development and the attainment of MDGs in Zimbabwe.
It says the official
report plays down the lack of capacity in state institutions to capture,
analyse and track data e.g. while the MDG reporting process was initiated in
2002 it was only finalised in 2004. Other examples cited include the 2002
population census whose results were only published in 2005. SusWatch says
monitoring Zimbabwe's implementation of Goal 1, which calls for halving of
extreme poverty by 2015, has been made difficult by government's failure to
publish the report of the 2003 National Poverty Assessment Study and the
absence of a poverty reduction strategy paper. This has left Zimbabweans to
estimate poverty levels in the country, with some putting them at over 60 percent.
Meanwhile the National
Poverty Assessment Study results are ready for publishing. However, one of
the sentiments from CSOs is the late publication of these results.
Non-availability of official updated poverty statistics and related data
impacts on poverty alleviation programmes and related initiatives.
Efforts to monitor Goal 7
on environmental sustainability are also constrained by a lack of reliable
information and lack of resources, says SusWatch.
"Data on
environmental issues is also very weak, making it difficult to give an
objective assessment of the status of the environment. The last State of the
Environment Report was produced in 1998, creating a data vacuum of astronomic
propositions", the report said.
On Goal 8
(Partnerships for Development), the SusWatch report said frosty relations
between government, CSO and international donors were a major drawback.
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MILLENNIUM
DEVELOPMENT GOALS NEWS FROM ELSEWHERE
Analysis - International
Perspective
The Trouble with
the MDGs: Confronting Expectations of Aid and Development Success - Working Paper 40
by Michael A.
Clemens, Charles J. Kenny and Todd J. Moss
The Millennium
Development Goals (MDGs) are unlikely to be met by 2015, even if huge
increases in development assistance materialize. The MDGs are a set of
quantitative, time-bound targets for indicators such as poverty, education
and mortality in developing countries adopted unanimously by
the UN in 2000. However, the rates of progress required by many of the goals
are at the edges of or beyond historical precedent. At the same time, there
appear to be limits to the degree to which aid can contribute to development
outcomes. Estimates of the ‘cost’ of reaching the MDGs are nevertheless
frequently misinterpreted to mean that a certain quantity of aid—such as the
oft-cited $50 billion—could cause the Goals to be met.
Despite many benefits of
the MDGs, there has been little discussion so far of potential costs of the
specific form taken by these goals, especially the creation of unreasonable
expectations about what is achievable in a short time frame and about the
role of aid in the development process. Many countries making extraordinarily
rapid progress on MDG indicators, due in large part to aid, will nonetheless
not reach the MDGs. Unrealistic targets thus may turn successes into
perceptions of failure, serving to undermine future constituencies for aid
(in donors) and reform (in recipients). This would be unfortunate given the
vital role of aid and reform in the development process and the need for
long-term, sustained aid commitments. Though goal-setting can be useful,
these particular goals might be better viewed not as practical targets but
instead as valuable reminders of the stark contrast between the world we have
and the world we want, and as a call to redouble our search for interventions
to close the gap more rapidly. full
paper
For full paper [pdf]
visit http://www.cgdev.org/content/publications/detail/2749
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CAPACITY BUILDING
Toolkit
for researchers and practitioners who wish to communicate to policymakers
by Hovland, I. /
Research and Policy in Development (RAPID), ODI, 2005
The tools in this kit are
specifically geared towards the needs of researchers and practitioners in
civil society organisations (CSOs), including development NGOs, research
institutes, think tanks, universities and networks. The toolkit addresses the
questions of how researchers and CSOs can best communicate evidence in order
to inform or influence policy, to achieve their own stated development
objectives, or simply to make their own knowledge accessible and
understandable to a wider audience. more..
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Member Profile
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Southern
Alliance for Indigenous Resources (SAFIRE)
 Background of SAFIRE
SAFIRE was established
as a PVO (Private Voluntary Organisation) in October 1994 at the behest of
the UNHCR, the Ministry of Environment and Tourism, the hosting RDCs and other
humanitarian organizations. The vision of the founding members of SAFIRE
was to establish SAFIRE as a local NGO with a regional mandate to address
environmental issues in Southern Africa.
Vision of
SAFIRE
To be the regional leader
and service provider of first choice in benefit-driven sustainable natural
resource management by rural communities.
Mission of
SAFIRE
To facilitate the
development and application of Innovative approaches to diversify and
improve rural Livelihoods, based on the utilization, commercialization and
sustainable management of natural resources.
The primary thematic
area of intervention for your SAFIRE is Natural resource management,
utilization and commercialization.
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Province
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District
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Eastern Region (Manicaland
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Mutare, Chimanimani, Chipinge, Nyanga.
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North
East (Mashonaland East)
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Muzarabani,
Rushinga, Hurungwe, Binga.
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South
East (Masvingo-Matabeleland):
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Masvingo,
Chiredzi, Bulilima, Mangwe, Gwanda, Mwenezi, Mberengwa, Beightbridge,
Plumtree, Matobo.
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SAFIRE can be contacted
on info@safire.co.zw
Website: http://www.safireweb.org
Each month, the MDGs e-Monitor
will profile a different organisation within the Sustainability Watch
Network (SusWatch).
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CONTACT MDGs e-Monitor
We value your
comments, suggestions and contributions. Please send these to Zimbabwe
SusWatch at: info@zeroregional.com
or shepard@zeroregional
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