Comments

Thanks for these comments. I stand corrected, James. My assertion was based on our "Lost Decade" report. Our Figure 7.2 has PNG MP funds at 9% of total expenditure and Solomon Islands at 8%. But that was a couple of years ago, and it sounds like Solomon Islands has changed since then. Philippines and Kenya were the only two other countries we could find where such funds made up more than 1% of total spending. That chapter has some useful information re your question Jo. It is hard to know how much of the MP funding ends up with schools and hospitals, but our survey in 2012 did find it was an important source of funding for them - and that was before the massive scaling up. For example, we found that 20% of schools and 23% of health clinics reported having benefited from MP funds. Most of the projects involved building something. You can read the analysis here (https://devpolicy.org/publications/reports/PEPE/PEPE%20Chapter%207.pdf) but the most telling statistic I think is that 41% of the schools and 45% of the health clinics believed that their MP-funded project would never be completed. Tony also makes an important point. 30% of the government's payments to schools are now made to MPs! (see Grant Walton's post: https://devpolicy.org/creeping-re-centralisation-pngs-education-sector-20160615/. So that should really be counted in the MP funding. That's an additional K 200 million or 1.5% of total spending.

Hmmm not sure I can see Bono making Donald Trump cry http://rgkcenter.org/sites/default/files/file/research/ISQU_451.pdf

Great post, thanks. Does anybody have any data or reasonable estimates regarding if and how much MPs spend from their funds on health and education, and what the nature of this expenditure is? I'm aware of all the problems/issues, etc. regarding constituency funds, just curious.

Also, the cuts to education and health funding are arguably made worse by the protection (in nominal terms) of "free" education and health policy funding in the budget. Free health policy is probably not providing any additional support to health clinics that were previously raising funds through user fees, and the same might be true for schools now that there are reports that a substantial proportion of TFF funds that were previously paid directly to schools (in lieu of abolished tuition and project fees) are being diverted to the control of district authorities. Again, something has to give within these sectors, and so the actual cuts to funding of goods and services that support education and health service delivery will be larger than what you have reported.

Stephen - thanks, fascinating post. If I could pick you up on just one point, that is your statement that 'PNG makes more reliance on spending through MPs than any other country in the world' (at 9% of total expenditure). My analysis of recent Solomon Islands budgets suggests that equivalent spending through MPs now represents over 14% of total SIG-funded outlays (recurrent and development budgets) in that country. Either way, both countries are international outliers in terms of the amounts allocated to such schemes.

Oh hang on!...there is another story, in fact a similar story of a boxer who stopped the nation. Even heard the politicians at the old House of Assembly/Parliament stopped their session to watch him fight a Filipino boxer. Name is Martin Benny of Central ...believed from Mekeo. Both boxers were great PNG sportsmen in their time. Their stories are inspirational and must be taught in PNG schools to inspire the young generations of PNGans.

PNG needs to tailor the concert again with deep research of the socioeconomic and cultural status of the nation.

What a waste of a lot of money that could be used for health, education and other programs in Kiribati itself or even building sea walls or cleaning up the beaches!! What are the current plans for that plot of land now? Fiji has its own racial problems without adding I-Kiribati people to the mix. What is going to happen to those poor Solomon Island people already there???

I think you're right to question Australia's high ranking for the development impact of its migration policies. Two other reasons to question the ranking than those you've raised are: - the targeted nature of our immigration policy and - the nature of contemporary world poverty. Our immigration policy is highly targeted. You touched on some of this <a href="https://devpolicy.org/third-best-class-australias-migration-policies-humanitarian-lens/">in your other post</a>. Our targeted policy means that the largest number of immigrants of the total immigration program are the highly skilled and educated - the elite. <a href="http://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/pubs/rp/rp1516/Quick_Guides/MigrationStatistics" rel="nofollow">For example</a>, in 2014-2015, 127 774 migrants were skilled, 61 085 migrants came through the family stream, and 13 756 through the humanitarian program. <a href="http://www.abs.gov.au/AUSSTATS/abs@.nsf/Latestproducts/6250.0Main%20Features3Nov%202013?opendocument&tabname=Summary&prodno=6250.0&issue=Nov%202013&num=&view=" rel="nofollow">Another example</a>, an estimated 62% of recent migrants had obtained a non-school qualification before arrival in Australia. If we were serious about the development impact of our migration policy we would increase the places allocated through the humanitarian program and the family stream. Contemporary research on world poverty shows that most poor people now live in middle-income countries rather than lower income countries. So to assess development impact we need to look at what type of people are migrating to Australia rather than only which country they are coming from. Finally, there is a question about the framing of CGD ranking that assesses development impact only on developing countries. Given the highly skilled, educated, and otherwise endowed nature of migrants shouldn't we also measure development impact the other way? That is, measure the way in which skilled migrants, from both developed and developing countries, contribute to Australia's development.

Hi Don, I am all for studying aid successes. Indeed, my blog was about one. I'm sure there are health infrastructure success stories in PNG, But I don't think building infrastructure should be seen as capacity building. Building clinics (and training health workers) are both just aspects of service delivery - they are no different in this regards to supplying drugs or supporting NGOs to deliver health services. They just support different aspects of the service delivery chain. The capacity building approach is, by contrast, about trying to improve government policy and planning, and is typically approached by Australia by the provision of advisers. This is where there are few successes. I do try to keep any eye out for them. The case of Australia trying to improve the procurement of drugs in PNG is an example of a repeated, and recent failure. On the issue of booms and busts, I agree that lessons should be learnt. There is a large international literature on this, the main take-way for me is that it is extremely hard to manage a resource-dependent economy. Turning points are notoriously hard to predict; and countries tend to borrow, increase the public-service salary bill, and introduce expensive new policies at the top of the boom. Unfortunately, PNG did all of these. That is the legacy of the resource boom, and it is why, apart from the revenue fall itself, core services are now being cut, and will continue to be underfunded for years to come. Regards, Stephen

No there is no strategic advantage for Australia in discontinuing successful programs, but there may be in reducing health aid expenditure if the government hosting your refugee detention centre prefers to have infrastructure funding.

Stephen, I also would not argue that “a sustainable funding mechanism” is the only place to start. I would argue that a sustainable funding mechanism is a fundamental pre-requisite for health development in PNG, and has not been achieved to date, partly because the magnitude of the gap has not been recognised. That applies to both donors and government. Either the global community and governments are serious about the health SDG, or we accept your view that “the health sector will remain under-funded for many years.” I believe it is a little too early to write the SDG’s obituary. In PNG and globally there is the potential to do better. Yours response to my comments on Capacity Building seem to confuse “Technical Assistance” with the broader concept of capacity building. Throughout PNG there are impressive examples of health infrastructure (hospitals, clinics etc) that have been built through Australian aid over the years, and are continuing to operate effectively. My point was not that there needs to be an influx of TA, but a sustained investment in the physical and human resources required to run a health system. For instance PNG produces only 45 doctors a year, while the population grows by over 200,000. Australian aid has put its hand up to a help address the Midwife shortage, the Pharmaceutical system failure etc. I don’t think you should be making these assertions on 6-year-old data. Time you brought your evidence base up to date, since 2010. Successes are worth identifying, though not as publicity worthy as the failures. Some of those success have been Australian Aid inspired, some led by parts of the PNG health sector. Some have even come about by MPs investing their funds in health services. Finally, your comment about resource booms and busts and “you can’t look to the extractive industry to help solve them for you”. Could not agree more. But third parties, if they are independent of the extractive industry, should be able to assess the extent that the costs and benefits of the operation of the extractive industry weight up in favour of the country’s citizens. The industry, while it negotiates its social licence, does create the impression that it will fill government coffers for years to come. The “surprise” of the revenue crash may partly be due to the lack of financial contingency, and third party scrutiny, of what these deals were likely to deliver, when and to whom. I believe there is a need for better understanding of how this government revenue crash occurred in this resource rich country, and how a more sustainable arrangement could be built based on the bitter experience of the last two years.