Finance and Economic Planning minister Claver Gatete, today, announces new Budget Allocations for Financial Year 2015/16, expected to be Rwf1.768 trillion. 

The new figure represents a slight increase of Rwf11.9 billion from the Rwf1.762 trillion Budget for the 2014/15 financial year.

But how did the government spend the closing financial year’s budget? A recap shows how various sectors used their Budget Allocations.

The Ministries of Infrastructure (Mininfra) and Agriculture (Minagri) are some of the most important sectors, with the former taking the lion’s share of the total National Budget, while activities in the latter impact on almost 70 per cent of the country’s rural livelihoods.

The New Times looked at the Budget for each of the two ministries to find out how they spent their allocations over the soon-to-expire financial year and found that Mininfra has executed 98 per cent of its allocation, while Minagri has overspent its share by Rwf7 billion.

Mininfra spends on energy, roads

According to Christian Rwakunda, the Mininfra permanent secretary, his ministry was allocated Rwf345 billion of the total resource package for 2014/15, and that budget execution stands at 98 per cent, with a few weeks to start of the new financial year.

Although it is Mininfra that received the Rwf345 billion, the spending was done on its behalf by eight government agencies that are the implementing vehicles of the ministry.

"We at the ministry focus on policy while implementation is done by the eight agencies,” said the permanent secretary.

However, the ministry maintains the supervisory role of the agencies.

The eight agencies include Rwanda Housing Authority (RHA), Rwanda Energy Group (REG), Rwanda Transport Development Authority (RTDA), Water Sanitation Corporation (WASAC), Road Maintenance Fund, Onatracom, RwandAir and Rwanda Civil Aviation.

"Energy, water and roads received over 60 per cent of our total allocation and it’s easy to see why because these are very critical sectors whose impact is felt by everyone,” said Rwakunda.

So, how was Rwf345 billion spent?

"The ministry recorded enormous achievements in road transport such as the completion of the 30-kilometre Butare-Kitabi-Ntendezi; lot three of Crete Congo/Nil-Ntendezi,” said Rwakunda. In total, the ministry used its resources to add at least 50 kilometres of new tarmac to the national road network.

Another 260 kilometres of national roads were also worked on under the periodic maintenance programme. They include 8 kilometres of Huye urban roads, Kigali city urban roads and the rehabilitation of Jomba-Shyira road as well as the 28-kilometre the Rwamagana-Zaza road.

Rwakunda added that the ministry used its Budget Allocation to expand the paved road network from 800 kilometres in the 2013/2014 financial year to 1,210 kilometres currently.

Big push for energy

At least 42.7 megawatts of electricity have been added to the national grid, thanks, mainly, to the country’s largest hydro-power plant, the 28 megawatts Nyabarongo I dam, which was inaugurated late last year.

Other additions were from smaller power projects, including the 2.2 megawatts from Rukarara two; 4 megawatts from Giciye micro-hydro and 8.5 megawatts from a solar project.

Rwakunda also revealed that at least 881.4 kilometres of low voltage transmission lines and 27 kilometres of high voltage lines were installed and completed between January and December 2014, a development that has helped to connect more than 85,500 new households to the national grid.

"The new households connected to the national grid brought the total cumulative connections to 474,083, which is 22 per cent of nation-wide access rate,” said Rwakunda.

The target is to have over 70 per cent access by 2018, under the second Economic Development and Poverty Reduction Strategy (EDPRS II).

At least 150 schools nationwide were also, reportedly, connected to solar energy sources between June and December 2014, while another over 1,000 solar electric systems were disseminated in selected off-grid areas during the same period.

However, although the ministry says it has put its 2014/15 resource allocation to good use, it’s still far from achieving its 2018 EDPRS II targets, where government pledged to increase power generation to at least 563 megawatts.

In the coming financial year, Minifra hopes to add another 70 megawatts to the current generation capacity of 160 megawatts, which will bring the total to 240 megawatts – still, less than half of the 2018 target.

At least Rwf339 billion is expected to be allocated to the ministry for the new budget year, to use in implementing its activities and draw the country closer to its set 2018 targets with only two financial years remaining; 2016/2017 and 2017/2018.

Minagri overspends its share

The agriculture sector received Rwf91 billion, as one of the priority areas under the EDPRS II to be funded in the 2014/15 Budget.

But, with vital projects such as the Priority Crops Intensification Programme (PCIP) and the Livestock Infrastructure Support Programme, the ministry is ending this financial year with negative balances after overspending to the tune of over Rwf7 billion, according to Innocent Musabyimana, the MINAGRI permanent secretary.

A big chunk of Minagri’s Budget Allocation for the closing financial year, Musabyimana said, was spent on the livestock infrastructure support programme which includes projects such as the One Cow per Poor Family (Girinka) and One Cup of Milk per Child programme, as well as the Gako Beef Project being developed to establish an intensive cattle and goat production system.

"The programme received Rwf7 billion of which Rwf6.9 billion has been spent so far,” PS Musabyimana told The New Times yesterday.

Musabyimana also said Rwf11.1 billion of the ministry’s allocation was spent on activities under the priority crops intensification programme. The money has been spent and the ministry has pending invoices from unpaid for activities.

"We will carry this forward to the next financial year,” he said.

The ministry also spent money on activities to implement irrigation and terracing projects across the country to help facilitate rural farmers and improve their productivity. It also spent on exports promotions activities.

However, by spending more than it was allocated, experts note that, perhaps it’s a call for the agriculture sector portion to be increased. For example, out of the Rwf12 billion budgeted for activities under the irrigation programme, it was only allocated Rwf4.1 billion.

The priority crops intensification programme which the ministry had budgeted for Rwf22 billion was only allocated Rwf8.3 billion.

But that’s part of the headache that the finance minister faces: to allocate the scarce resources among so many good government projects.

The practice is that ministries conceive programme ideas which are then forwarded to the public investment committee to analyse and approve them for implementation.

Although the committee has approved many of the programmes for implementation, the line ministries complain of not being given enough resources to get on with the execution; however, the Finance ministry can also only allocate what it has.

As usual, by the time Minister Gatete leaves Parliament today, there will be losers and winners, those with bigger allocations and those whose shares will be reduced.

The good news for agriculture is that its allocation for the new financial year is expected to be increased by Rwf13 billion to Rwf104 billion, hence giving it more room to try and drive the country forward on the development path.

The sector, just like that of infrastructure, also gets external financing support from development partners such as the World Bank, for certain projects.

The Rwanda Agricultural Board will receive most of the money allocated to Minagri because it will be the main implementing agency of most of the ministry’s programme activities. editorial@newtimes.co.rw