Social spending in Guatemala needs toachieve efficiency gains and increase to minimum levels tomeet basic human development objectives. Current levels areso low that fiscal reform (in revenue generation andspending allocation) is urgently needed so that the statecan fulfill its mandated coverage and quality in socialservice provision. In the last ten years, Guatemala has haddecent economic growth but failed to improve humandevelopment indicators or reduce poverty (which hasincreased). Low and inefficient public spending, coupledwith outdated legal and institutional frameworks, aresignificant barriers to increasing enrollment and providingquality education. Moving forward, more efficient,equitable, and cost-effective public education spending willrequire some important policy and institutional changes,including greater use of the incipient monitoring andevaluation system. There is need for increased spending insocial assistance interventions, better coordination amongimplementing agencies, and revised targeting to ensuredecent coverage of programs among the poorest. On theinstitutional side, the launching of the Ministry of SocialDevelopment (MIDES) provided a platform to manage thedifferent programs of the sector under one umbrella;however, MIDES has not yet been able to tackle technicaldeficiencies in implementation.
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