The U.S. State Department annually publishes assessments of the quality of fiscal transparency in countries that are eligible to receive U.S. foreign assistance. We outline in this video the overall state of Central Africa fiscal transparency in the 2022 calendar year drawing on the results of the 2023 fiscal transparency assessments for nine Central African countries.
These assessments, published on 27 June 2023, found that while all nine countries did not meet the U.S. State Department’s minimum fiscal transparency requirements, six countries demonstrated significant progress was evident in 2022.
The U.S. State Department’s recommendations for improving fiscal transparency in the nine countries not meeting minimum fiscal transparency requirements are presented in the video and cover government budget, audit, natural resource extraction and sovereign wealth fund activities.
The most numerous deficiencies identified in fiscal transparency in Central African countries in 2022 were in the following government budget processes:
- Publishing executive budget proposals within a reasonable period
- Producing end-of-year reports within a reasonable period
- Eliminating off-budget accounts or subjecting them to adequate oversight and audit
We also examine the relationship between identified fiscal transparency deficiencies and 2022 Corruption Perceptions Index scores. In addition, we suggest sources of technical assistance that governments might access to assist their efforts to improve fiscal transparency and indicate how fiscal transparency improvement activities could be monitored.
You can access the individual country reports here:
