Moldova has significantly improved its position in the world ranking of budget transparency by improving public access to budget information.
These are the results of the Open Budget Survey for 2023, presented by Expert-Grup Independent Think-Tank at a conference with the participation of representatives of the Ministry of Finance, the EU Delegation to Moldova, the IMF Delegation to Moldova, the Court of Accounts and other institutions. According to the study, Moldova's budget transparency score increased from 65 points in 2021 to 81 points in 2023 out of a possible 100. This means that citizens have greater access to the information they need to participate in decision-making and hold the government accountable. Moldova improved the degree of disclosure of information on budget documents and ranks 5th out of 125 countries included in the assessment. Moldova's score is close to that of Bulgaria, Slovakia, Ukraine, Romania, and the Czech Republic. In Moldova, the level of oversight by the Parliament and the Court of Accounts was assessed at 61 points out of 100, while the world average is 53 points. In the Public Participation section, Moldova showed an upward trend compared to the assessment of 2 years ago: from 11 points in 2021 to 18 points in 2023, which is higher than the world average of 15 points. This means that the government has succeeded in increasing citizen participation in the budgeting process. Poland, Ukraine and Slovakia received similar scores. According to Adrian Lupusor, Expert-Grup's executive director, the think tank has been conducting this independent assessment of the budget process since 2012 together with the International Budget Partnership. “There is some progress despite some recent limitations. There is progress in terms of transparency, access to information, participation in the budget process and accountability of the parties involved,” he said, emphasizing that the results need to be strengthened and continued. Finance Minister Petru Rotaru, while commenting on the results of the study, said that this external analysis allows identifying weaknesses and strengths, helps to make the budget process transparent and provide information in the most accessible format for citizens. “This is how we understand whether our initiatives for 2022-2023 have been effective and delivered the expected results. In each budget cycle, we improve the mechanism itself and expect to implement the proposals resulting from this study,” the Finance Minister said. It should be noted that the 9th edition of the Open Budget Survey includes 125 countries. Moldova has been officially participating in the survey since 2017. In 2023, only published documents and events, activities or events that took place until December 31, 2022 were evaluated. The Survey is based on a questionnaire completed in each country by an independent expert in the budgetary field. The draft questionnaire of each country was also checked by an anonymous independent expert, and in Moldova - by a representative of the Ministry of Finance. // 04.06.2024 - InfoMarket.
