County Budget and Development Data (ELG0008)

Establish, maintain and disclose accurate and updatable county development, service and budget data to inform decision-making processes and citizen oversight
Commitment Start and End Date 1st September, 2018 – 31st August, 2020
Lead implementing agency/actor
Department of Finance and Economic Planning
Commitment description
What is the public problem that the commitment will address?
Inadequacy of verifiable, accurate and updatable service and statistical data for planning and budgeting has impeded (limited) government ability to plan well and deliver the most needed and preferred public services using the scarce public resources in its possession. This has also limited citizens, CSOs and other stakeholders in the oversight ecosystem to assess and hold the government accountable on the decisions it takes including the impact of its spending on the livelihoods of its people. This has been compounded by failure of government to fully disclose and publish impact data from programs funded from conditional grants from the National Government and development partners as well as decisions regarding recurrent expenditure thus making it difficult for citizens to assess and oversight this component of the whole budget.
What is the commitment?
The department in charge of Economic Planning will delve to establish, maintain, disclose and disseminate accurate and updatable data and indicators on development and service delivery. It will also disclose budget financing, including conditional grants and accompanying conditions from national government and development partners as well as development partners’ inputs in advancing development and services delivery. The services data will be used to inform planning and budgetary decisions while creating public knowledge on the recurrent expenditure and National government and donor supported development initiatives and, to provide an avenue for citizens to hold the county government accountable on its governance decisions, including government efforts towards achievement of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).
How will the commitment contribute to solve the public problem?
The commitment seeks to analyze, regularly update and disclose data on development and service delivery to enhance accountability, transparency and facilitate informed decision making. This will provide development stakeholders and government departments with open data segregated into relevant thematic areas and groupings to inform planning, budgeting and impact assessment. This will be achieved by creating an open data framework which will facilitate the collection, analysis, interpretation, updating and disclosure of necessary government data for multiple-usage by stakeholders.
Why is this commitment relevant to OGP values?
This commitment is relevant to access of information, civic participation and accountability because it will provide data and information which will facilitate citizens to participate from information point of view and to hold government to account on its spending
Additional information
Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS) is mandated through the Statistics Act to generate, undertake surveys, regulate, analyze and disseminate national data for decision making purposes. However, since the operationalization of devolution in 2013, counties have realized inadequacies in the data for own use, in particular planning and budgeting. Thus, the need for county specific and relevant data which may not necessarily be part of the data being generated and analyzed by KNBS yet the demand for county specific indicators continue to grow.
Milestone Activity with a verifiable deliverable
Department of Finance and Economic Planning in collaboration with CSO partners will conduct a baseline assessment on availability, use and need for data across sectors to establish existence, accuracy, storage and format that facilitate regular updates
Staff time, consultancy, conference costs, stationery, ICT equipment and research tools
Sep 2018 July 2019
Department of Finance and Economic Planning will develop a policy to facilitate a structured generation, usage in planning and budgeting and, updating of county data and to facilitate unrestricted public access. Such data will be designed to show how service access and development affect demographics by gender and age, consistent with Sustainable Development Goals (SDGS). The policy will also provide for the methodology for collection, analysis and digitized storage of both historical and current data
Staff time, consultancy, conference costs, stationery and ICT equipment
Nov 2018 Apr 2019
Department of Finance and Economic Planning will create a repository (open data platform) to enhance unrestricted public accessibility to open, accurate, up-to-date and relevant data.
Staff time, consultancy, conference costs, stationery, ICT equipment and research tools
Jan 2019 Dec 2019
Finance and Economic Planning in collaboration with Civil Society Organization (CSOs) partners will segregate and disseminate simplified budget information of summary annual budget and their funding sources.
Staff time, stationery and display boards and ICT platforms
Sep 2018 July 2019
Department of Finance and Economic Planning in collaboration with CSO partners will develop a donor support policy to provide framework for partnership, grants management and public disclosure.
Staff time, consultancy, conference costs, stationery
Sep 2018 Dec 2019
Department of Finance and Economic Planning in collaboration with relevant CSOs and development partners will develop and publish work plans for all conditional grants-supported -projects and programs. It will also summarize and publish via the county website and project implementation system and, disseminate through public participation at County Fiscal Strategy Paper (CFSP) stage, the full records of Appropriations-in-Aid (A-in-A), donor supported initiatives, loans and conditional grantssupported-development initiatives with focus on project, program and program objectives, funding amount and expected results.
Staff time, stationery and display boards and ICT platforms
Sep 2018 July 2019
Contact information
Name of responsible person from implementing agency
Mr. John Maritim
Title, Department
Director Economic Planning and Budgeting, Finance and Economic Planning Department
Email and Phone
jomaritim@gmail.com +254722425863
Other Actors Involved
Directorate of Communications, Directorate of ICT and Directorate of County Administration, Department of Agriculture (currently piloting data generation)
Center for Innovation in Open Governance (CIOG Kenya), Kenya National Bureau of Statistics (KNBS), Rongo University, University of Eldoret, Development Initiatives (DI), World Vision Kenya, International Crops Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics (ICRISAT), Kenya Plant Health Inspectorate Service (KEPHIS)