Annual Astana Civil Service Hub Conference 2021

ERI experts spoke at the Shifts in Public Administration Reforms for Achieving the SDGs: Imperatives and Lessons from the Covid-19 Pandemic Session.

On 27-29 October, the Annual Astana Civil Service Hub Conference was held on public service development and cooperation. The Conference was attended by representatives of government agencies and internationa.organizations, experts and scientists from 40 countries, including employees of the SDGs Secretariat of the Economic Research Institute.

The second Conference day was dedicated to Shifts in Public Administration Reforms for Achieving the SDGs: Imperatives and Lessons from the Covid-19 Pandemic 

In the opinion of Juwang Zhu, the Director of the Division for Public Institutions and Digital Government, UN DESA, local executive authorities should be the engine for achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.

Yerlan Abil, the Rector of the Academy of Public Administration under the President of the Republic of Kazakhstan, noted that public administration is currently under transformation using a project-based approach to achieve sustainable development.

Frank V. Zerunyan, the Professor at University of Southern California, shared his reasoning on "What makes public administration effective?". In his view, cooperation, accountability, transparency and trust are key factors of efficiency.

Aigul Kosherbayeva, CEPA member, Vice Rector of the Academy of Public Administration, developed the Professor Frank's topic further and presented 11 principals of good governance for sustainable development. 

The principles are grouped into three clusters:
 1) efficiency: principles of competence, sound policy and collaboration;
2) accountability: principles of honesty, transparency and independence of supervision;
 3) inclusion: Leave No One Behind, non-discrimination, subsidiarity and equality principals between generations. 

These principles support the establishment of strong institutions and provide an analytical basis for policy formulation.

Today, a collaborative system of government is being built to implement 11 principles through the shift:

—     from productivity to capacity;

—     from results to progress;

—     from coordination of actions to coordination of vision;

—    from management to cooperation.

Open Government plays a key role in achieving the SDGs, Habib Zafarullah concluded, the Chairman of the South Asian Network for Public Administration. At the same time, civic engagement is a new imperative of democratic space, and decision-making should be based on evidence.

Bakytgul Khambar, the Director of the SDGs Secretariat of the Economic Research Institute (ERI) says that the effectiveness of public institutions to achieve SDGs is impossible without the implementation of SDG budgeting principles.

Although the SDGs basic principles are integrated into the state planning system of Kazakhstan, there are a number of problems that hinder this process: 

1) inability of government agencies to report on public expenditure and investment related to SDGs,
2) low budget accountability for SDGs,
3) limited communication on SDGs policies and objectives, 

4) gap between decisions and statistical monitoring.

The effectiveness of governance to achieve the SDGs in terms of sustainability and continuity of public service delivery in times of crisis was highlighted by three speakers: Zorka Kordic, representative of the Office of the Prime Minister of Montenegro, and Arpine Korekyan and John-Mary Kauzya, the Division for Public Institutions and Digital Government, UN DESA.

Aranzazu Guillan Montero, Oversight and Accountability during the pandemic, and Gary Manukyan, Reducing Inequality and Bridging Digital Divide Through Public Administration Education, also spoke on the UN DESA part.

The session resulted in a number of recommendations:

—     examine the balance between quick wins and long-term goals such as SDGs, climate change, demographic shifts, etc.;

—    the need to develop critical and systemic thinking, creativity and adaptability for civil servants, the ability to learn how to analyse big data and the ability to make management decisions in a changing environment;

—    civil society and business should become agents of change, working constructively with government to address local and national issues;

—    take crucial steps necessary for the sustainable development;

—    accelerate the implementation of SDG principles in the budget process, which will promote transparency and accountability;

—     determine targets for national indicators, taking into account the resource potential of the country;

—    recognize the need for active proliferation in SDGs.

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