Issued publication Suggestions and guidelines for introducing the gender perspective in the local budgets in Bosnia and Herzegov
In the framework of the project "Gender sensitive
budgeting", a publication Suggestions and guidelines for gender sensitive
budgeting in Bosnia and Herzegovina has been issued. After completing the
analyses of the municipalities' budgets, the teams of analysts prepared a
report consisting of the analysis of basic categories of the public expenditure
on the local levels and delivered it to Association Vesta, which has, with the
help of the gender mechanism in Bosnia and Herzegovina, prepared and printed
the publication. Since the key arguments for justifiability of starting the gender
budget initiatives have been stated in the publication, it presents the basis
for integration of gender into the criteria which determine drawing up and implementation
of municipalities' budgets, and which are applicable to budgets on all levels
of the authority. The publication has been therefore presented to the wider
public, and it has also been sent to Gender centers in the Federation of Bosnia
and Herzegovina and the Republic of Srpska, a mandate of which is to gather
initiatives relating to changes of legislation from the aspect of gender.
The aim of this publication is to be a set of tools for questioning gender perspectives of the public revenue and expenditure, actually for determining the existence of the same in the management and allocation of means collected from the tax payers. In order to use these tools on the local budgets more concretely, the basic categories of the public expenditure in 5 municipalities in Bosnia and Herzegovina (Banovići, Srebrenica, Bijeljina, Travnik and Tuzla) have been analyzed, and these analyses have been included into the publication. The local communities have been taken as examples, as it is evident that they present the first and only immediate form of authority, which is expected to satisfy the citizens' needs on the basis of the law, international standards and conventions. This necessarily means that each improvement of the local policies implemented through the budgets on that level of authority almost always reflects on the improvement of the living and working conditions of the residents of that local community. Therefore, in the context of advocacy and real improvement of the budget policies, and in favor of better living conditions, this publication should give a moderate contribution.
The aim of the publication is to give the key arguments for justifiability of realizing the gender budget initiatives and their application on the local and governmental programs. In that sense, it presents the foundation for introducing the gender sensitive procedures for drawing up, suggesting, accepting and implementing the budget on all levels of authority in Bosnia and Herzegovina, which would, besides other things, enable equal participation of men and women in preparation and drawing up of the budget, and monitoring of the effects of such a budget on improvement of the status of women in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The purpose of the publication Suggestions and guidelines for introducing the gender perspectives into the local budgets in Bosnia and Herzegovina is to draw attention of the citizens to the need for their active participation in deciding about the ways of spending consumption and the part of their means which they pay through taxes, fees and duties to the budgets of their local communities. Another purpose is to reach a synergy effect through a partner action with the wider community.
