Latest issue of IJGFM now available

The latest issue of the International Journal of Governmental Financial Management was recently published and is now available for free download from: www.icgfm.org/journal.htm

In the first paper of this issue, David Hall provides the second half of his study on public finance. David notes that taxation tends to increase as a proportion of GDP as countries develop, but also that the burden of taxation has become less fair, because countries have moved towards regressive taxes such as value added tax (VAT), which hit lower incomes harder. He also argues that rather than reducing public sector spending as many European countries, for example, are now being encouraged to do, the better alternative is to develop stronger and fairer taxation systems and to continue to grow public spending to meet the challenges of the future, including climate change.

In our second paper, Michael Parry reviews and compares the financial reporting (IPSAS) and statistical standards for financial information about public sector institutions – particularly sovereign governments. He concludes that there appears to be a general acceptance that statistical reports and financial statements have different objectives and will never be fully harmonised.

In the next paper, Robert Quaye and Hugh Coombs investigate Ghana’s organised economic crime legislation strategy and the extent to which it has met international requirements in respect of anti money laundering measures. The research objective was to acquire a bottom up and comprehensive picture of Ghana’s experience of such legislation and associated regulation. The paper discovered there was general agreement amongst practitioners that, while Ghana had passed relevant legislation relatively quickly, there was concern over how the legislation worked in practice and the cultural acceptance of corrupt behaviour.

In our fourth paper, Sidhakam Bhattacharyya and Gautam Bandyopadhyay consider the background to urban local bodies in India. In particular they consider imbalances between their constitutional responsibilities, their financial resources and the impact of certain financial controls on the performance of these bodies as measured by their annual level of recurrent surplus of deficit.

In our final paper, Mohamed Moindze reviews the modernisation of internal control of public expenditure in francophone African countries. He concludes that it would be unrealistic to establish an internal control system that aims to eliminate any risk of loss. But the costs of any internal control system should be balanced with the benefits of reduced errors, fraud and corruption (this paper is in French).

We again end this issue with a section reviewing recent public financial management publications and other resources which we hope will be of interest to readers of the Journal.

Finally we have included a short questionnaire with this issue. The aim is to consider how well the Journal is meeting the needs of its readers and contributors and what further improvements may be made. We would greatly value feed-back from our readers – we look forward to hearing from you!