Poverty and Human Development Report 2009 - UNDP in Tanzania

evise allocations based on identified local needs. With little locally-generated revenue and tight
budgets compared with responsibilities, LGAs still have limited autonomy in spending.
Despite these constraints, the latest round of the Afrobarometer survey in 2008 found that a
majority of citizens were satisfied with government education and health services, with more rural
residents expressing approval of government efforts in these sectors than urban residents. In
contrast, less than half of all respondents were satisfied with water services, reflecting continued
low levels of access to clean and safe water supplies. Of additional concern, the number of LGAs
with clean audit reports from the National Audit Office dropped from 81% in 2006/07 to 54% in
2007/08, a result partly due to conflicting instructions received by LGAs about the preparation of
their accounts. A higher proportion of respondents in Afrobarometer 2008 also held the opinion
that local councillors were involved in corruption than in the previous round of the survey in
2005. Overall, therefore, the process of strengthening fiscal autonomy and transparency in
local government authorities and, in turn, improving service delivery appears to be progressing
slowly. Of further note, the financial management by central government ministries, departments
and agencies (MDAs) generally shows improvement over time. The percentage of MDAs which
received a clean (unqualified) audit certificate rose from 34% in 2004/05 to 76% in 2006/07, but
fell back to 71% in 2007/08.
Another important goal of the governance cluster is to improve personal and material security
and to reduce crime. The Afrobarometer 2008 revealed mixed perceptions on public safety.
Positively, a substantial majority of the citizens surveyed did not fear crime in their homes and
had not experienced theft from their home over the past year. However, the percentages of
respondents who reported trust in the police and courts of law declined between 2005 and
2008. The proportion of respondents who trusted the police ‘somewhat’ or ‘a lot’ fell from 85%
in 2005 to 60% in 2008. Similarly, citizens’ level of trust in the courts of law (‘somewhat’ or ‘a lot’)
diminished from 85% in 2005 to 73% in 2008.
Policy Implications
eXeCUtiVe sUMMarY
The MKUKUTA target to reduce income poverty by half by 2010 is now out of reach, and Tanzania
faces a huge challenge to achieve MDG1 by 2015. To do so annual real consumption growth of
3.2% per capita will be needed, which is four times higher than that achieved between 2000/01
and 2007. Since Tanzania’s level of income inequality is low, even by international standards,
redistribution of income is not likely to be effective. A strongly focused approach to sustain
and accelerate growth is needed that fully exploits Tanzania’s comparative advantages and
propels domestic employment and productivity – and, in turn, incomes and consumption levels
– particularly in rural areas.
Encouragingly, from a policy perspective, a significant proportion of households have consumption
levels not far below the poverty line. Households, too, are already diversifying out of agriculture
to improve well-being. Indeed, diversification of income-generating activities is occurring across
all wealth quintiles. However, the success of households in diversification varies markedly. The
least poor households earn approximately eleven times more in non-farm self-employment than
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