Antigua and Barbuda - How disaster resilient is Antigua and Barbuda’s public financial management?

This paper addresses the question how disaster resilient Antigua and Barbuda's public financial management is. Effective institutions and systems of public financial management (PFM) play a critical role in the preparation and response to disasters. Strong PFM ties together often scarce available resources with their appropriate and sustainable use to ensure that governments can function reasonably well even in times of disasters. It is an analytical instrument that seeks to help countries build resilient, responsive PFM systems by pinpointing critical PFM policies, practices, and procedures that can be strengthened to improve a government’s capability to respond more efficiently and effectively to disasters, without loss of the integrity and accountability. The disaster risk reduction (DRR) - PFM review focuses on five key elements of the PFM system: legal and institutional foundations; budget appropriation arrangements; financial management controls; procurement arrangements; and public investment and asset management.

The paper identifies five areas of key challenges:

• Legal and institutional framework;
• Budget appropriation;
• Financial management controls;
• Public procurement; and
• Public investment and asset management.