Fiscal space for strengthened social protection in West and Central Africa - Briefing paper

Implementing social protection programmes can be challenged for tax reasons, even when the programmes are deemed necessary at the political and institutional level. This document emphasises the importance of considering the question of "fiscal space", that is, government budgetary leeway for financing new initiatives without damaging the country's macroeconomic stability. West and Central African countries generally have very limited budgets, except for a few oil-producing countries. In these conditions, fiscal space can only be created if political space already exists that legitimises new initiatives such as social protection systems. The document offers a methodological framework for evaluating the fiscal space and applies it to the five case studies: Congo, Equatorial Guinea (greatest fiscal space due to oil revenue) Ghana (smallest fiscal space), Senegal and Mali.

 UNICEF, ODI - 2009