Experts discuss public sector reforms in OECD countries

DOHA: Experts shared the experiences of Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries in public sector modernisation reforms in a workshop organised by Qatar Institute for Public Finance (QIPF). The workshop served as a professional platform to explain the basics of good and transparent reporting on performance, while presenting case studies that demonstrate the implementation of such policies and adopting best practices in different OECD Countries. 
It focused on the challenges, lessons and opportunities of using Performance Information for Public Sector Budgeting and Management. The two-day workshop was organised in the presence of Undersecretary of the Ministry of Finance Khalaf bin Ahmed Al Mannai, CEO of Qatar Finance and Business Academy Dr. Abdelaziz Al Horr and distinguished speakers from Austria and Canada. 
QIPF held a press conference yesterday to highlight some of the outcomes and valuable insights gained from the workshop on the challenges, lessons and opportunities of using Performance Information for Public Sector Budgeting and Management.
“As citizens’ expectations from government and public service institutions continue to evolve, a cohesive Public Sector reform and modernisation strategy is no longer a luxury in today’s world. It is at the heart of bringing about positive change and creating an environment that both facilitates and governs a country’s growth and development … Which is why we gathered in this workshop,” said Khalaf bin Ahmed Al Mannai, Undersecretary of the Ministry of Finance. 
“As a member of OECD, Qatar, through its Ministry of Finance and other stakeholders in the Public Sector, has taken this critical mission seriously and dovetailed it with the country’s National Development Strategy 2011-2016, resulting in a raft of structural reforms,” he added.
“We sincerely hope that the Qatari experience in public sector optimisation reforms brought value to the conversation and can benefit other OECD countries embarking on the same course of action, the same way we have gained a better understanding of some aspects of the process through the workshop’s insightful sessions,” Dr. Al Horr said.
During the workshop, OECD’s Budgeting and Public Expenditure Senior Policy Analyst Delphine Moretti and Jón R. Blöndal, Head of Budgeting and Public Expenditures division in OECD highlighted the main concepts associated with performance evaluation in the public sector, and provided an overview of Practices and Reforms in OECD Countries.
Gerhard Steger, the former Director General for Budget and Public Finances of the Austrian Federal Ministry of Finance, presented how, in Austria, performance objectives and indicators are defined with the objective of limiting performance information to the most relevant aspects for decision-making, and remaining constant over a long period of time, in order to be able to monitor developments, and providing understandable data to users.