The proposed Gender Responsive Budgeting Initiative is aimed at giving a further boost to women’s participation in the taking of economic decisions.
When introduced, Ghana will be the 41st country in the world to have adopted such an initiative, which is to be implemented soon.
This, according to those who initiated the system, would help strengthen women’s participation in economic decision-making through their engagement in budgetary processes, as well as enhance the incorporation of gender into economic governance and leadership processes.
To this end, Ministries, Departments and Agencies (MDAs) in the country have been called upon to change their organisational culture to accommodate gender responsive budgeting in their programmes.
At a stakeholders seminar on Gender Budgeting Initiative (GBI) organised by the Ministry of Women and Children’s Affairs (MOWAC) in collaboration with the Ministry of Finance and Economic Planning (MOFEP) and the National Development Planning Committee (NDPC) in Accra on Thursday, the Minister of Women and Children’s Affairs, Hajia Alima Mahama, announced that her outfit had developed a gender mainstreaming and budgeting tool kit to train desk officers of MDA’s under the pilot programme.
The need for a GBI became necessary after Cabinet approved the adoption of a gender responsive budgeting guideline for all ministries, departments and agencies (MDAs) in the 2008 budget.
The approval, which was in response to a memorandum of understanding submitted by Hajia Mahama, also gave policy direction for all the MDAs to take into account critical gender equality, equity and women empowerment concerns at all levels of activity planning and resource allocation.
Outlining the objectives of the seminar, she said it was aimed at enlightening the stakeholders to understand gender responsive budgeting and its role in the accelerated growth and poverty reduction agenda of the country.
The seminar, she said, was also to expose policy makers, planners and resource allocation institutions to the enormous benefits of gender responsive budgeting.
She also said stakeholders at the seminar were also expected to familiarise themselves with the step-by-step approaches involved in the gender responsive budgeting process, as well as draw lessons from good practices and challenges of other countries.
The United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) representative in Ghana, Mr Daouda Toure, in an address said gender budgeting was important to the work of the UNDP and the entire UN system in its efforts to support governments to achieve sustainable and equitable human development, especially with regards to commitments made to the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).
Gender budgeting he said, would ensure that budget allocated reflected the differential needs of men and women based on an analysis of the needs of each group.
When implemented, Mr Toure said gender budgeting would also help citizens to hold governments accountable for their commitment to gender equality and women’s human rights.
He further explained that the budget, as one of a country’s most important economic instruments, expressed a government’s relationship with its people and could also be used in ways that demonstrated national commitment to empower citizens as well as promote opportunities and self development.
Adopting a gender responsive budget, according to him, was also a reflection of the political will within a country to confront the socio-cultural, economic and development challenges the country faces .
Mr Antwi Baffour who represented the Deputy Minister of MOFEP, Prof Gyan-Baffour, said one crucial prerequisite for the acceleration of a gender responsive budget was gender mainstreaming.
He said in furtherance of that objective, the government had ensured that the National Development Policy Framework ,Ghana Poverty Reduction Strategy (GPRS II) was engendered with specific focus on strategies to address gender inequality, women empowerment, vulnerability and excluded social groups.
Mentioning some of the benefits that the government expected to gain from a gender responsive budget, he said adopting that system would encourage gender perspective in national planning and budgeting process to ensure that the different needs of various social groups; men and women, and particularly the poorest of the poor, most of whom he said were women, were taken into account in the national development policy planning, programme design and resource allocation.
Gender responsive budgeting, he said, would also help the government to probe into whether men and women fared differently under existing revenue and expenditure patterns, thereby providing the government the opportunity to understand and appreciate how various social groups responded differently to development policy change over time.
He said it would also help the government to appreciate the need to adjust its priorities and resource allocation in line with its commitment to achieving gender equality under the MDGs.
A Capacity Building and Gender Consultant, Mrs Patience Agyare Kwabia, who made a presentation on ‘Operational definition of gender budgeting and its benefits to Ghana’s accelerated growth and development’ said the introduction of such an initiative would help break the cycle of what she described as ‘neutral budgets’ which did not specify benefits for men, women and children.
• Hajia Alima Mahama, Minister MOWAC, addressing the seminar. With her are, the Chief Director of MOWAC, Mr Valentine Kuuzume (left), and Mr Antwi Baffour from MOFEP who deputised for the Deputy Minister of Finance, Prof Gyan- Baffour.
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