Virtual : Fiscal Reporting and Transparency

Source details

Event: Virtual : Fiscal Reporting and Transparency (FRBT)
Session No.: SA 22.01 V
Deadline passed
Location: New Delhi, India
Date: January 17-20, 2022 (1 week) New dates
Delivery Method: Virtual Training
Primary Language: English
Target Audience: Mid - to senior level officers from the Ministry of Finance, including from the Treasury, Budget, and ICT departments.
Qualifications: No formal qualification is required, but it is expected that participants should have experience in working on (or at least exposure to) one or more of the following areas: fiscal reports, government financial statements/accounts, government budgets andfiscal forecasts, FMIS, and fiscal transparency portals.

Fiscal transparency is defined as the comprehensiveness, clarity, reliability, timeliness, and relevance of public reporting on the past, present, and future state of public finances.
Fiscal transparency is critical for effective fiscal management and accountability and helps ensure governments have an accurate picture of their finances when making economic decisions, including of the costs and benefits of policy changes and potential risks to public finances.
Fiscal transparency provides legislatures, markets, and citizens with the information needed to hold governments accountable.
Greater fiscal transparency can help strengthen the credibility of a country's fiscal plans and can help underpin market confidence and market perceptions of fiscal solvency.
Seminar introduces the IMF's Fiscal Transparency Code (FTC) — the international standard on transparency of public finances — and how to identify necessary improvements in country fiscal transparency practices using examples from the application of the FTC during Fiscal Transparency Evaluations (FTEs).
Seminar discusses how various digital tools, including fiscal transparency portals and open data platforms, could help enhance fiscal transparency.
Seminar promotes peer learning by encouraging participants to share experiences and views on key enablers of fiscal transparency and how it contributes to coherent fiscal policies, strategic allocation of public resources, efficient service delivery, and greater accountability.

Appreciate the importance of fiscal transparency and why it matters for managing public resources and ensuring accountability;
Understand how to ensure that fiscal reports provide a comprehensive, relevant, timely, and reliable overview of the government's financial position and performance;
Recognize that budgets and their underlying fiscal forecasts provide a clear statement of the government's budgetary objectives and policy intentions, and credible projections of the evolution of the public finances;
Identify innovative digital tools and practices that can facilitate better fiscal transparency, including the role of financial management information systems (FMIS) and fiscal transparency portals;
Recognize key enablers for improving data quality for fiscal decision-making and transparency; and
Connect and share experiences with peers who are undertaking various measures and implementing reforms to improve fiscal reporting and transparency.