The Strengthening Public Expenditure Management project [SPEM], supported by DFID, Swedish SIDA and the Netherlands Embassy, a six-year programme, introduced new budget planning software for all ministries, as well as new management structures with clear performance and accountability measures, designed to meet EU standards. The project has been implemented by a consortium of three companies – REPIM, Oxford Policy Management and Intech+.  It has helped to reinforce the Government’s public finance reforms particularly in the implementation of its Integrated Planning System, which is aimed at ensuring that it has budgets that are clearly linked to its policies. To mark the completion of the project a press conference was organised on 25 November 2008 where present were the Minister of Finance, Ridvan Bode, Deputy Minister of Finance, Sherefedin Shehu; British Ambassador Fraser Wilson, Head of Swedish Office in Tirana,  Elisabeth Stam, Ambassador of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, Henk Van Den Dool and SPEM Project Director, Martin Johnson.

Speech of Ambassador Fraser Wilson at Completion Event for the SPEM Project

Speech of the Head of Swedish Office in Tirana, Elisabeth Stam

How the public money is spent through the eyes of a cartoonist