Decentralization and Transfer of the Responsibilities to the GOB. Programa de Apoyo a la Descentralización del Estad operates in Ecuador.
Through technical assistance and training, the program aims to support decentralization and the transfer of responsibilities to sectional governments in Ecuador. It also supports updating of the legal and financial framework for fiscal decentralization. The components are: (a) support for implementation of decentralization; (b) support for fiscal decentralization; (c) studies; and (d) citizen communication and social participation. Component 1 supports: (a) development and consolidation of the legislative and institutional framework for subnational organization and decentralization; (b) transfer processes envisaged in the first three annual decentralization plans; (c) strengthening of the ministries of the central and sectional governments involved in negotiations for the transfer of powers; and (d) establishment of coordination mechanisms for public policy formulation in the context of decentralization. Component 2 helps the Ecuadorian government refine the current subnational fiscal management model through: (a) studies to prepare alternative models for financing the sectional governments; (b) actions to strengthen the local tax administrations; (c) studies and proposals to implement cofinancing mechanisms; and (d) studies, to be undertaken by the National Council on Modernization of the State (CONAM), to design information systems for decentralization, monitoring, and control of the finance and performance of sectional governments. Component 3 funds: (a) studies, to be undertaken by CONAM, of the physical boundaries of indigenous and Afro-Ecuadorian districts, modeling alternatives, with community participation, for their location, boundaries, governance, exercise of powers, and fiscal resources, in order to prepare for new legislative proposals; and (b) studies of ways to deepen subnational autonomy. Component 4 supports public information and citizen oversight to follow the progress of fiscal and administrative decentralization through: (a) monitoring of public opinion; (b) citizen communication activities; and (c) promotion of social participation.
The components of the program have not yet been determined.
