Zimbabwe’s Finance and Economic Development Ministry had by end of September not fully disburse the 2022 National Budget allocation it allocated to the Health and Child Care during the 2022 national budget.
By Kuda Pembere
This was said by Bulawayo Central Member of Parliament Hon. Nicola Watson who is also the acting chairperson of the health and child care parliamentary committee on Wednesday.
The Ministry of Health and Child Care had received 85% of the revised budget of ZWL$146.63billion as at 30 September 2022,” she said.
During the period in question, employment costs such as salaries and recruitment gobbled much of the disbursed amounts with 141 percent followed by operation costs having 40 percent while capital had 12 percent.
“As shown in Table 1, as much as 141% of the salaries budget; 12% of capital budget and 40% of the recurrent expenditure had been exhausted as at 30 September 2022. The utilization rate for central hospitals was 94% while that of provincial hospitals was 89%. District hospitals had a burn rate of 81%,” said Hon. Watson.
Hon. Watson also said the health ministry only received 32 ambulances out of the 100 promised. “The Ministry implemented several capital projects in 2022 although these are at various levels of completion.
These include the acquisition of medical equipment (30% complete); construction of Lupane Provincial Hospital (11% complete); Upgrading Ambulance Fleet (100) (32% complete); NMS-New Clinics (4) (25% complete); Staff Canteens (75% complete); Health Posts (10) (20%); Natpharm Storage (100% complete); Rehabilitation & Refurbishment of Central and Provincial hospitals (25% complete),” she said.
Employment costs according to Hon. Watson will take up over 70 percent of the allocated budget for the Health Ministry.
“Employment costs will take up 73.1% of the Ministry’s total budget compared to 21.5 % originally allocated in 2022 (see Table 2) or 47.3% allocated in the 2022 revised budget. This allocation represents a significant increase in employment costs from the 2022 allocation,” she added.
She also bemoaned that the share of the health budget to total expenditure for 2023 remains significantly below the 15% stipulated under the Abuja Declaration for the delivery of quality health services.
The Ministry of Health and Child Care received an allocation of ZWL$473.76 billion (equivalent to US$740.5 million using official rate) compared to ZWL$117.7 billion (US$ 1.1 billion using official rate) originally allocated in 2022.
“This allocation represents a 302.5% nominal increase to what was allocated in the previous budget. It further represents a10.54% share of the National Budget indicating a marginal decline from 12.16% that was achieved in the 2022 National Budget,” Hon. Watson noted.
She said the trends in the Ministry of Health and Child Care budget allocations and its share to National Budgets from 2014 to 2023 showed a reduced share of the budget allocation.
