As part of the cooperation with the World Bank-Austria Urban Partnership Program, NALAS and its Fiscal Decentralization Task Force took part in the workshop on Modernizing Local Public Expenditure Management, organized in Mavrovo, Macedonia, from 15-17 May 2012.
The workshop focused on local expenditures and selected aspects of expenditures management, such as: Recurrent expenditures versus capital investment expenditures; Budget as a tool for expenditure monitoring and control; Making budgets real: planning methods, expenditure control techniques; Procuring, contracting, and regulating private providers; Price setting of local utility services; Promoting or reversing private provision of utility services, etc.
The workshop sessions were organized as a series of presentations and panel discussions, providing a good opportunity for sharing information and experiences among the countries of the region, as well as global cases in expenditure management.
During the workshop, NALAS presented its report on Fiscal Decentralization Indicators for South-East Europe, prepared by the Fiscal Decentralization Task Force, which provides reliable comparative data on municipal finances and intergovernmental fiscal relations in South-East Europe.
59 participants from Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro, and Serbia attended the workshop, representing local government associations, partner cities, local experts and a delegate from the Kosovo Ministry of Finance.