The making of public investments: The role of champions, co-ordination, and characteristics of nutrition programmes in Mozambique

Tewodaj Mogues and Lucy Billings

Food Policy, 2019, vol. 83, issue C, 29-38

Abstract: This study examines governance and institutional factors that influence how public resources are allocated for nutrition interventions in the context of a developing country—Mozambique—with very high rates of malnutrition. Based on qualitative empirical analysis building on a political economy framework, we explore the importance of two agent-centred and two investment-centred factors that determine how decisions on budget allocation to nutrition are made. The analysis finds that public decisionmakers strongly favour highly visible nutrition investments and those with a short duration between the time that spending is incurred and outcomes or outputs are achieved. Co-ordination has been quite successful among donors, and mainly of a spatial nature. Co-ordination is significantly weaker among government agencies, given the absence of fiscal tools of the co-ordinating agency, and its placement in a sector ministry rather than at a supra-sectoral level. Champions as change agents have had a truly influential role in attracting more funding to nutrition and improving its allocation. But their influence is also fleeting and difficult to sustain.

Keywords: Malnutrition; Public spending; Governance; Political economy; Budget allocation; Agent-centered and investment-centered determinants (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:jfpoli:v:83:y:2019:i:c:p:29-38

DOI: 10.1016/j.foodpol.2018.11.001

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