Content:
Politically speaking, forestry is a priority for Uganda. The country has a new forest policy and new forestry legislation. It has restructured forestry governance and developed a National Forestry Plan that has been mainstreamed into the country’s poverty reduction strategy. Uganda has a decentralized governance system, elaborate planning and budgeting procedures and impressive fiscal transfers. The country has gone a long way towards implementing all the key outcomes of the global forest dialogue and the tenets of the Paris Declaration.
Yet despite these efforts that clearly demonstrate Uganda’s recognition of the socioeconomic and environmental value of forests, forestry is still not a priority in terms of budget allocations for development programmes. An examination of planning, budgeting and fiscal resource allocation in Uganda quickly reveals the challenge posed in bridging the gap between the global discussion on forest finance and what is realistically achievable within the current national frameworks.
Insufficient financial allocations to forestry can be attributed in part to the sector’s weak institutional visibility, to the scanty political support for a sector that is not an immediate ‘vote magnet’, and to the difficulty in demonstrating in the short term the role forestry plays in supporting other sectors of the economy. However, it is above all the country’s budget ceilings that are the main culprit.
The current global debate on forest finance revolves around whether increased, new and additional financial resources from all sources should be provided through a global forest fund or a facilitative mechanism. Yet in the case of Uganda, this somehow misses the point: even if such a fund or mechanism existed today, how could Uganda access such resources for forestry, given its budget ceilings? And Uganda is not alone - there are around 40 heavily indebted poor countries (HIPC) facing a similar dilemma. The issue of budget ceilings is clearly a burning one.
Adapted from “Challenges in mobilizing forest finance in a heavily indebted poor country: case study of Uganda”, by Jones Kamugisha-Ruhombe, Coordinator of the Forest Finance Programme of the Global Mechanism of the UNCCD, entitled recently published in the international journal on forestry, Unasylva (Vol. 61, 2010)
Click here to read the full article
For more information:
Mr J. Kamugisha-Ruhombe, Coordinator, Forest Finance Programme
j.ruhombe (at) global-mechanism.org
Challenges to mobilizing forest finance in Uganda
20 July, 2010
Yet despite these efforts that clearly demonstrate Uganda’s recognition of the socioeconomic and environmental value of forests, forestry is still not a priority in terms of budget allocations for development programmes. An examination of planning, budgeting and fiscal resource allocation in Uganda quickly reveals the challenge posed in bridging the gap between the global discussion on forest finance and what is realistically achievable within the current national frameworks.
Insufficient financial allocations to forestry can be attributed in part to the sector’s weak institutional visibility, to the scanty political support for a sector that is not an immediate ‘vote magnet’, and to the difficulty in demonstrating in the short term the role forestry plays in supporting other sectors of the economy. However, it is above all the country’s budget ceilings that are the main culprit.
The current global debate on forest finance revolves around whether increased, new and additional financial resources from all sources should be provided through a global forest fund or a facilitative mechanism. Yet in the case of Uganda, this somehow misses the point: even if such a fund or mechanism existed today, how could Uganda access such resources for forestry, given its budget ceilings? And Uganda is not alone - there are around 40 heavily indebted poor countries (HIPC) facing a similar dilemma. The issue of budget ceilings is clearly a burning one.
Adapted from “Challenges in mobilizing forest finance in a heavily indebted poor country: case study of Uganda”, by Jones Kamugisha-Ruhombe, Coordinator of the Forest Finance Programme of the Global Mechanism of the UNCCD, entitled recently published in the international journal on forestry, Unasylva (Vol. 61, 2010)
Click here to read the full articleFor more information:
Mr J. Kamugisha-Ruhombe, Coordinator, Forest Finance Programme
j.ruhombe (at) global-mechanism.org