Can developing countries create strong Public Financial Management (PFM) systems, without a way to measure progress and make corrections? This would be like a ship sailing unchartered seas without a compass. The Public Expenditure and Financial Accountability (PEFA) Framework, a global gold standard for assessing a country’s PFM systems, can be a powerful guiding tool to help governments raise financial resources and spend them efficiently for service delivery.

Zambia is an example of a country that has been successfully leveraging the results of its PEFA Assessments which involve evidence based measurements of country’s PFM systems to provide a score card of performance against various indicators to embark on an ambitious and promising reform path. Zambia is one of the early adopters of PEFA framework, the first assessment done as early as 2005, when the framework became available.  - blog.wb.org/blogs