The Inter-American Development Bank today announced the approval of $153.6 million in financing for Uruguay to support a comprehensive public administration modernization program.
The financing consists of a $150 million fast-disbursing sector loan and a $3.6 million technical cooperation loan. Both loans were granted for 20-year terms, with five-year grace periods and at a variable interest rate, currently at 7.1 percent per year.
The resources will support Uruguay's efforts to boost the productivity of its government's central administration and the quality of the services it provides, in order to reduce the costs imposed on the private sector and improve the living standards of its citizens.
The program, which will be carried out by the Planning and Budget Office*, will seek to raise state revenues by making collection mechanisms more efficient and establishing appropriate incentives. It will also improve the efficiency and quality of public spending, reduce the cost of government intervention for the private sector and individual citizens, and pave the way for the modernization of the state's management of its human resources.
Another key goal of the program is to make central administration actions more transparent in the eyes of citizens and the private sector.
One of the program's four components was designed to improve the management of public sector resources by modernizing the administration of state revenues, enhancing the efficiency of state spending, reducing the cost of public sector procurement and making it more transparent and improving the management of state-owned real estate.
Another component will seek to boost competitiveness by cutting red tape and simplifying regulations, prices and charges fixed by the state. Another component will include actions to improve the quality of services provided by the central government to citizens and the transparency of state actions. A fourth component will foster the modernization of the legal framework for central administration staff management, reforms of the National Civil Service Office and the implementation of new information systems.