Conclusions and recommendations
The Zambian Government's public expenditure: opportunities
for spending more efficiently
1. There are significant
inefficiencies in Zambia's public expenditure. The biggest of
these is the 'maize subsidy', which costs 8% of the Government
budget; this is a sum which considerably exceeds DFID's bilateral
aid programme. The abolition of the 'maize subsidy' would free
up funds to provide much needed services, for example free secondary
education. We believe that the Government of Zambia wants to do
something about it, but faces serious political constraints. We
urge that the UK continue to provide the greatest encouragement
and support to the Government of Zambia to remove the maize subsidy
and switch resources to public services such as secondary education
(Paragraph 14)
DFID's Programme
2. The priority areas
of DFID's bilateral programme are human and social development,
wealth creation and governance. These priorities are agreed and
coordinated with the Government of Zambia and other donors and
we approve them. (Paragraph 20)
Human and Social Development
3. Maternal mortality
in Zambia is appallingly high and its reduction is a key priority
for the Government of Zambia. A major cause of high maternal mortality
rate is lack of access to reproductive health. There is a particular
need for contraceptive implants, which are restricted by national
health policy to provision by doctors only. We recommend that
DFID encourage the Government of Zambia to allow clinicians other
than doctors, including nurses, midwives and community health
assistants to be trained to provide Long-Acting and Permanent
Method contraception. We welcome DFID's decision to increase its
spending on reproductive, maternal and newborn health and recommend
that it be focused on rural areas and young people. We recommend
that the increased expenditure be continued from 2012-13 into
future years. (Paragraph 32)
4. Violence against
women is at an appalling level in Zambia. We met girls involved
in an impressive Adolescent Girls Empowerment Programme and recommend
that DFID increases spending on this programme if it proves over
time to be as effective as we think it likely to be (Paragraph
36)
5. We strongly support
the Zambian Government's emphasis on increasing the number of
clinicians. We welcome the Minister's enthusiasm for encouraging
links between UK and Zambian health professionals and universities,
in particular to help train their Zambian colleagues. We recommend
that DFID provide small amounts of funding to facilitate this
(Paragraph 41)
6. We recommend that
support for secondary, tertiary and vocational education be a
priority for DFID's education expenditure. We welcome DFID's decision
to pay more attention to this following our visit. In its response
to this report, DFID should outline in more detail both its plans
to help the Government of Zambia make improvements in these areas
and how it will work with the British Council and other bodies
to do this. (Paragraph 48)
7. There is a lack
of competent middle management across the Zambian economy in the
public and private sector. We recommend that DFID look at how
to assist Zambia make improvements to business education (Paragraph
49)
Wealth creation
8. Smallholder agriculture
is a key area for economic growth. We welcome the proposed rural
markets development programme which seeks to increase the productivity
of poor smallholder farmers by strengthening markets for inputs
and crops. We note, however, that there has been a significant
decrease in proposed funding for this project since our visit
which is in part explained by the involvement of the Swedish Government.
In its response to this report the Government should provide more
details of the new funding arrangements for the rural markets
development programme (Paragraph 55)
9. Following CDC's
reorganisation, we see a major role for the organisation in initially
co-investing and subsequently directly investing in Zambian businesses.
This will generally be more appropriate than DFID providing grants
for private businesses. We recommend that CDC and DFID Zambia
work closely together. (Paragraph 60)
Governance
10. A key part of
improved governance is an effective Parliament. DFID's Public
Financial Management programme is making improvements to the Zambian
Parliament's examination of the budget. DFID spent £1.4million
between 2008-11 on Parliamentary strengthening. This programme
has stopped but the CPA is working with the Zambian Parliament
to develop a new programme. We welcome the DFID Minister's support
for the CPA's proposal and recommend that DFID provide funding
for it, possibly from the new Democratic Representation programme.
We also recommend that for future years a measure for Parliamentary
strengthening replace the number of people voting in elections
supported by DFID as one of DFID Zambia's top three results.
(Paragraph 69)
Graduation from aid
11. DFID's Annual
Report and Accounts for 2011-12 states that DFID is working to
help Zambia graduate from aid. We note that no similar comment
is made in the Report and Accounts about any other country, including
those with a similar per capita incomes. We agree that DFID should
work towards graduating from aid, but this should apply to all
countries. Given the extent of poverty we do not believe that
Zambia will be in a position to graduate from aid for many years
and are pleased that the Minister agrees. (Paragraph 72)
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