About the activity

The Local Finance Benchmarking Programme was implemented in Greece by the Centre of Expertise with the support of the Regional Development Institute.

This activity aimed at providing the Hellenic Ministry of Interior with a policy advice to support improvement of the intergovernmental fiscal relations, as well as the management of local financial resources.

 Methodology

The final report includes benchmarks which were specifically developed for Greece covering the following technical areas: local taxation, grant allocation policies and methods, fees and charges, borrowing, sound financial management framework (budgeting and budget implementation).

These benchmarks served as a checklist for assessment of fiscal decentralisation, intergovernmental fiscal relations in the field of local resources and municipal financial management.

Implementation of the Local Finance Benchmarks in Greece implied the collection of a comprehensive set of qualitative and quantitative data through interviews with relevant stakeholders, development of a disaggregated local finance database, review of data provided by the Ministry of Interior and a survey addressed to Mayors.

More precisely, in depth interviews were organised in February 2017 with representatives from the Ministry of Finance, the Court of Audit, the General Secretariat Anti-Corruption, local governments of both tiers, and a number of International Organizations working on local financial issues in Greece such as the French Agency of Technical International Expertise (Agence Française d'Expertise Technique Internationale - AFETI), the International Monetary Fund (IMF),and the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD).

 Acknowledgements

Greek stakeholders showed great interest in the activity and shared their knowledge and first-hand experiences with enthusiasm.

The Centre of Expertise would like to thank all parties involved in the activity for their fundamental contribution to this extensive analysis.