THE Anambra State Government in partnership with EU/WHO organised a stakeholders workshop on Public Finance Management Reform, PFMR, guidelines and scoping assessment finding agenda.
The objective of the workshop is to engage the ministry of health and the stakeholders to come up with regular communication and exchange in PFMR activities.
It was also to update on the current PFMR situation in the state ministry of health and consensus on the PFMR situation, including current budget process, capacity building and the electronic systems to adopt.
Vincent Okpala, commissioner for health, said the workshop was aimed at ensuring that stakeholders understood Public Finance Management Reforms for effective healthcare delivery.
“The objective of the PFMR is to strengthen and to improve the efficiency of public health financing in the state through Public Finance Management Reforms, including Programme Based Budgeting, PBB.’’
The idea of the workshop, which was held in Awka was to create a replicable model of PFMR in the health sector and strengthen the existing public finance management system in a more coordinated manner to meet the fiscal and financial policy challenges.
Okpala noted that in 2017, the state government established State Health Insurance Agency, which had been adjudged the best in Nigeria and the efforts are geared toward achieving Universal Health Coverage for people of the state.
He noted that the State Health Financing was one of the six building blocks of the Health System Strengthening, HSS, project and had many areas of which PFMR was the key priority area.
“In 2015, the President signed Memorandum of Understanding, MoU, with EU to be implemented by WHO and to strengthen the health system under the HSS project, which is part of the effort to achieve Universal Health Coverage,’’ he said.
According to him, Nigeria is currently not on track in achieving Universal Health Coverage, UHC.
“The sub-optimal performance of Nigeria’s Health System can be attributed to poor financing of the required investment for delivery and management of health sector.
“EU/WHO, through the State Ministry of Health has started the implementation and the alignment of the Public Finance Management Reform for health in the state.
“A Desk review has been conducted on this by the consultant appointed by WHO of which stakeholders here has been part of the review,’’ he added.
The State Coordinator of WHO, Chukwumuanya Igboekwu, said the workshop was geared toward achieving Universal Health Coverage.
Igboekwu said that the EU/WHO partnership had started to yield positive results.
He assured that the EU/WHO would continue to support the state through the HSS project.
The participants included the Secretary to the State Government, SSG, Prof. Solo Chukwulobelu, the Commissioner for Economic Planning, Mark Okoye, and the Special Adviser to the Governor on Health, Simeon Onyemaechi.