Highlights Education spending remains high and should enhancing the ...

[Pages:16]Highlights

Education remains one of the key areas of social development to which the Government has a strong commitment in Botswana. The sector is guided by comprehensive national and sector policies that address issues of quality, access and relevance across the entire education sector.

The current Education and Training Sector Strategic Plan (ETSSP) (2015-20) is intended to address the sector's key challenges and guide a shift towards outcomes-based education.

The public sector plays a dominant role in education, apart from early childhood learning. There are two main education ministries responsible for delivering education services in schools (for Primary and Secondary Education, and for Tertiary and Vocational Education), with smaller roles played by the ministries responsible for local government and employment.

The education system is almost entirely funded by domestic public resources, with little donor funding. Education is the largest single recipient of public spending, with the sector receiving more than 21 percent of the total budget.

Almost all children benefit from ten years of education (primary plus junior secondary).

While secondary and tertiary education are well funded (on a per learner basis), pre-primary and primary education appears to be under-funded, meaning that educational foundations are weak.

Pre-primary and primary education is free while some parents of secondary school pupils pay fees covering a small fraction of education costs.

At the tertiary level, students are meant to repay loans after graduating, but this is not well enforced. In general, efforts to implement cost-recovery measures to offset education expenditure have not been successful.

Despite high levels of funding, the education sector faces several challenges:

? Inadequate transition from junior to senior secondary education;

? A mismatch between education outcomes and labour force needs;

? Poor education performance and results by international standards.

The budget briefs explore the extent to which the public budget addresses the needs of children under 18 years in Botswana. Their main objectives are to synthesize complex budget information so that stakeholders easily understand it and to put forth key messages to inform financial decision-making processes.

Education spending remains high and should continue to be prioritised, while being better

targeted on underfunded segments and enhancing the economic opportunities open

to learners and delivered in a more costeffective manner

Key Policy Issues

Maintaining public spending on education at least at the current level (7-8 percent of GDP), even as budgets come under pressures;

Addressing spending inefficiencies within the education system, especially strengthening the capacity for planning and implementing development budgets (which cuts across four ministries: MOBE, MOTE, MELSD and MLGRD);

Improving budgetary reporting; the current budget structure does not easily allow analysis of how much is being spent on each level of education, or where. In order to address inefficiencies in spending, as well as to understand how resources are being allocated across different levels of education and different regions, more disaggregated reporting of education expenditure is required;

Rebalancing education spending towards primary education, which suffers from poor quality, inadequate resources and a disproportionately large student-teacher ratio.

Seeking sustainable financing of the education sector through the active participation of parents, the private sector and institutions of learning and research.

Enforcing the repayment of loans by tertiary education graduates.

Section 1. Introduction

Ambitious national and sector development plans guide Botswana's education system. The overarching plan, National Vision 2036, is implemented through a series of medium-term plans. The current plan, National Development Plan 11 (NDP 11), runs from 1 April 2017 to 31 March 2023. It aims to provide the foundation for the transformation of Botswana into a knowledgebased economy and emphasizes the importance of education to improve the quality of the labour force. It also acknowledges key challenges in the sector, including gaps in inclusion, poor secondary to tertiary transition rates, and a mismatch between skills and labour force needs.1 To this end, the government aims to continue investing a portion of mineral revenues in the development of human capital (the remainder is invested in physical or financial assets). NDP 11 1 is currently undergoing a mid-term review (MTR), which provides an opportunity for refinement of policies and programmes, as well as revision of spending commitments. The further development of human capital, including through education and training, is one of the national development priorities highlighted in the MTR of NDP 11. Operationally, the Education and Training Sector Strategic Plan (ETSSP), which covers the period 2015 to 2020, is intended to address key challenges and guide the sector. The ETSSP emphasizes the importance of: (i) laying a solid foundation at pre-primary education level; (ii) teacher education and professionalism; (iii) enhanced participation of private sector and parents; (iv) technical and vocational education; and (v) the sector's strategic role as a catalyst in economic transformation and national development. The below chart demonstrates some of the key targets to be achieved by 2020 (Figure 1).

Figure 1: Selected ETSSP enrolment targets to be achieved by 2020

Source: Botswana Education & Training Sector Strategic Plan (ETSSP 2015-2020), April 2015

The ETSSP guides investment in the education sector and identifies several critical priorities and goals drawing on available human and financial resources (Figure 2). It is implemented through eleven programmes, including five thematic programmes focused on system level reforms deemed necessary to support the implementation of the ETSSP policies and strategies. A major component of the ETSSP is a focus on outcomes and a shift towards outcomesbased education, which has implications for curriculum, teaching methods and assessment. The ETSSP is comprehensive but provides little guidance on priority setting in education and does not

1 Ministry of Finance and Development Planning (2016),Botswana National Development Plan 11, p.68.

provide an indication of relative prioritization. Overall, priority-setting can be done at different intervals in the policy/programme planning and implementation.

Figure 2: The Education Sector Strategic Priorities within the ETSSP

2

Source: Adapted from the ETSSP.

In Botswana's five-tier education system, the public sector plays a dominant role, apart from early childhood learning. In terms of structure, pre-primary education covers ages 4 to 5 years, primary 6 to 12 years, junior secondary 13 to 15 years, senior secondary 16 to 17 years and tertiary 18 years and above. Pre-primary and primary education is free. For secondary education, there is a cost-sharing arrangement whereby parents pay a fee equivalent to ten percent of the estimated cost, on a means-tested basis. However, no student can be denied access due to the inability to pay fees, so payment of the fee is essentially voluntary. The age of entering school varies a great deal, and some children start education later than the "official" start of primary school at age 5-6. As a result, Gross Enrolment Ratios are significantly higher than Net Enrolment Ratios (indicating that many "out of age group" children are attending school). Although school attendance is not compulsory, most children now attend primary school (at least), even if some start late. Enrolment in primary schools has almost stopped growing, indicating that (i) attendance is high and (ii) there is very slow growth of the primary school age cohort. At tertiary level, depending on the course, the student receives a mixture of loans and grants. While there are private sector providers at all levels of the education system, most learners go to public schools. In 2015, for example, 93 percent of primary school students and 96 percent of secondary school students were enrolled in government or government-aided schools2. The only exception is at the pre-primary education level, where more than 70 percent of students are enrolled in private schools and centres.

2 Statistics Botswana (2019) Primary and Secondary Education Statistical Briefs 2015.

Figure 3: Primary and Secondary School Enrolment

a) GER and NER

b) Annual Enrolment Growth Rate (2007-2015)

120% 100%

80%

1.0% 0.8%

60%

0.6%

40%

0.4%

20% 0%

0.2%

3

GER

NER

GER

NER

0.0%

Primary (6-12) Secondary (13-17)

Primary (6-12) Secondary (13-17)

Source: Statistics Botswana (2019), Primary and Secondary Education Statistics, 2015

Botswana's education system ? primarily managed by four ministries ? has been a major priority since independence. In the past, two ministries have been mainly responsible for delivering education services in schools, namely the Ministry of Education and Skills Development (MOESD), and the Ministry of Local Government and Rural Development (MLGRD). In 2016, there was a major rearrangement of government ministries, and the old Ministry of Education was split into two new ministries, namely the Ministry of Basic Education (MOBE) and the Ministry of Tertiary Education, Research and Technology (MOTE). The Ministry of Employment, Labour and Skills Development also plays a role, with a focus on vocational skills training.

The MOBE is now responsible for pre-primary, primary and secondary education. The MOTE deals with technical education and training (TET) and teacher training, as well as universities.

Section 2. Education spending trends

Education continues to receive the highest share of funding in the national budget. Public expenditure on education has been steady over the past years averaging 22 percent of total budget between 2014/15 and 2018/19, followed by economic and general public services at 20 and 18 percent, respectively.

The allocation of the largest share of the budget to education is a long-standing characteristic of expenditure in Botswana. Public spending on education includes recurrent and development (capital) expenditures. Since 2011, after a period of relatively high expenditure driven mainly by capital investment, average spending on education has been around 7.6 percent of GDP (Figure 4-a). During NDPs 9 and 10, development expenditures on education remained high and mainly focused on secondary (construction of more secondary schools) and tertiary education (establishment of new universities and a teaching hospital).

Public investments in the education sector have grown significantly in recent years, even when factoring in changing price levels. In nominal terms, in 2019/20, total spending equalled P14.5 billion, which is 53 percent more than the 2013/14 spending. When adjusting for inflation,

the rise in spending is still strong, jumping nearly 31 percent over the five years from 2013/14 to 2018/19, which is around 5.6 percent real annual growth. When comparing 2018/19 and 2017/18, the education sector budget increased by 10.8 percent in nominal terms and 7.6 percent in real terms (Figure 4-b). However, education expenditure is expected to decrease by 0.6 percent in nominal terms in 2019/20 (Figure 4).

Under the new structure in the current fiscal year, the priority of education remains nearly identical, receiving about 21.4 percent of total budget resources. This demonstrates that government has continued to exceed the international spending benchmark of 20 percent of the national budget for education as put forth by Education for All.

Figure 4: Priority within the overall budget

4

16

14

12

10

Billion Pula

8

6

4

2

0 2013/14

2014/15

2015/16

2016/17

2017/18

2018/19

2019/20

Education Defence Health Housing,Urban & Regional Development

General Public Services Economic Services Other community & social services Food & Social Welfare Programmes

Source: Ministry of Finance and Economic Development, Financial Statements, Tables and Estimates of Expenditure from the Consolidated and Development Funds for various years.

The allocation of the largest share of the budget to education is a long-standing characteristic of expenditure in Botswana. Public spending on education includes recurrent and development (capital) expenditures. Since 2011, after a period of relatively high expenditure driven mainly by capital investment, average spending on education has been around 7.6 percent of GDP (Figure 5-a). During NDPs 9 and 10, development expenditures on education remained high and mainly focused on secondary (construction of more secondary schools) and tertiary education (establishment of new universities and a teaching hospital)3.

Public investments in the education sector have grown significantly in recent years, even when factoring in changing price levels. In nominal terms, in 2019/20, total spending equalled P14.5 billion, which is 53 percent more than the 2013/14 spending. When adjusting for inflation, the rise in spending is still strong, jumping nearly 31 percent over the five years from 2013/14 to 2018/19, which is around 5.6 percent real annual growth. When comparing 2018/19 and 2017/18, the education sector budget increased by 10.8 percent in nominal terms and 7.6 percent

3 Botswana Public Expenditure Review, the World Bank, March 2010, page 96.

in real terms (Figure 5-b). However, education expenditure is expected to decrease by 0.6 percent in nominal terms in 2019/20.

Figure 5: National education expenditure trends

(a) Education Expenditure trends, % of GDP

14%

Recurrent

12%

Development

10%

8%

5

6%

4%

2%

0%

Billion Pula

(b) Education Expenditure, nominal vs real (constant 2013/14 prices)

16

14

12

10

8

6

4

2

Nominal

0

Real

Note: *Estimated based on projections. Source: Ministry of Finance and Economic Development, Financial Statements, Tables and Estimates of Expenditure from tvhe Consolidated and Development Funds for various years. Inflation estimates the IMF's World Economic Outlook Database (April 2018).

Takeaways

? Botswana has a strong commitment to investing in education, as demonstrated by consistent spending increases and the high budget priority devoted to the sector.

? The Government should maintain public spending on education at least at the current level (7-8 percent of GDP) in the coming years, with specific focus on public expenditure on service delivery targeting children.

Section 3. Composition of education spending

In the current fiscal year, the education sector received about 26.7 percent of total recurrent budget, which is in line with the government's commitment to prioritise human capital development (Figure 5). MOBE will spend P8.24 billion for payment of utilities, books, equipment, maintenance of facilities, food supplies in secondary schools, as well as other education-related commitments, including teachers' salaries and allowances. MOTE is allocated P4.54 billion that will be spent mainly on tertiary student scholarships and subventions to University of Botswana and Botswana International University of Science and Technology.

Figure 6: Priority within the recurrent spending on education 6

100%

90%

80%

70%

60%

50%

40%

30%

20%

10%

0% 2013/14 2014/15 2015/16 2016/17 2017/18 2018/19 2019/20

General Public Services Defence Economic Services Health Education Other

Source: Ministry of Finance and Economic Development, Financial Statements, Tables and Estimates of Expenditure from the Consolidated and Development Funds: 2013/14 to 2016/17 (actual), 2017/18 (revised) and 2018/19 (planned).

The bulk of education spending goes on schools. In 2019/20, the MOBE received around 65 percent of total education spending (for pre-primary, primary and secondary schools). MOTE received 34 percent, for universities, teacher training and TET.

Although representing only a small portion of the education budget, development expenditure has increased in recent years. Prior to the restructuring, this expenditure was split between MOLGRD (responsible for infrastructure development for pre-primary and primary levels) and MOESD (for all other levels). On average, development expenditure accounted for 8 percent of the total education budget. Over the 2013/14 to 2017/18 period, development expenditure grew by more than 67 percent, which was largely driven by a greater emphasis on basic education infrastructure (Figure 7). The MLGRD capital budget doubled further in 2018/19 mainly for completion of existing infrastructure projects and maintenance. In 2019/20, a sizable portion of the MOBE's development spending (about 85 percent) is allocated to secondary education for construction of additional facilities in rural educational establishments. In the current (2019/20) fiscal year, MOBE experienced an increase in allocations of 30.8 percent and MOTE experienced a decrease of 28.2 percent. In relation to development resources 61.7 percent are allocated to MOBE and 16.7 percent to MOTE.

Billion Pula

Figure 7: Ministerial composition of the education development budget

1.6

1.4

1.2

1.0

0.8

0.6

7

0.4

0.2

0.0 2013/14 2014/15 2015/16 2016/17 2017-18 2018/19 2019/20

MOESD MOBE MOTE MLGRD

Source: Ministry of Finance and Economic Development, Financial Statements, Tables and Estimates of Expenditure from the Consolidated and Development Funds for various years.

Despite the large size of the recurrent education budget, it is not possible to clearly identify the allocation of resources between different levels of education, and hence to identify whether supporting basic education and improving its quality is being prioritized. Published budget figures do not distinguish between the costs of primary and secondary education. The majority of the MOBE recurrent budget - 65 percent in 2019/20 - went to "Teaching Service", which includes salaries for primary and secondary levels. Only non-salary expenses are allocated separately to "Department of Pre-primary and Primary Education" (1.3 percent of the recurrent budget), "Department of Secondary Education" (21 percent) and "Headquarters" (11 percent) (Figure 8). Furthermore, the development costs for primary education are met by local councils through an allocation from MLGRD, while the remaining school capital costs are met by the MOBE. Therefore, within education spending, a breakdown of allocations by sub-sector is not readily available.

As part of the ETSSP's M&E framework, an annual sector review (ASR) is proposed to assess annual progress of the entire education sector against the key performance indicators, both at a national and regional level.4 Improving planning and budgeting of the education sector is one of the ETSSP's strategic priorities.5 The development of an effective budgeting system that supports education policies requires a detailed breakdown of allocations by subsector, programme and where relevant sub-programme.

4ETSSP 20, page 154. 5Ibid, page 173.

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