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Azerbaijan ranks 50th in Open Budget Index

11 February 2009 13:54 (UTC +04:00)

Baku. Elnur Huseynguluyev â€“ APA-Economics. Azerbaijanâ€™s score of 37 on the Open Budget Index places it 80th out of the 85 countries surveyed, said Ingilab Ahmadov, Leader of the Azerbaijanâ€™s National Budget Group.
Azerbaijan sat in the 45th place among 59 countries in the OBI-2006 ranking.
The report released by the Centre for Budget and Governance Accountability and Washington-based International Budget Partnership shows how countries provide their citizens with information about the financial activities.
While UK, South Africa, France and United States feature at the top for providing extensive information to its citizens, the worst offenders are Algeria, Saudi Arabia, Rwanda and Sudan ... for providing scant information.
The index is based on a survey of 85 countries, only five of which scored more than 80 points. The scores rise with the clarity, scope and availability of documents on public spending. The average index score was just 39, indicating a low level of transparencyâ€”tending to encourage the wasteful and corrupt use of public money. The worst offenders, with scores between zero and 20, are often poor countries.