REPIM, established in 1988, is an economic consultancy with extensive worldwide experience. REPIM specialises in the economics of change, the process of structural adjustment and the development of optimum economic policies. REPIM’s strength lies in the formulation of strategies and policies for economic development and in the institutional strengthening and support required to ensure their long-term success. REPIM has extensive experience in the design, implementation, management and evaluation of projects and programmes. Sound economic principles applied in practical terms underpin our approach.
Please contact John Short at:
REPIM, Fernwood House, West Woodfoot, Slaley, Hexham,
Northumberland, NE47 0DF, England
Tel: 44 (0) 1434 673385
Fax: 673618
Email: John Short
Who works for REPIM
| Core Consultants |
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John Short has extensive academic and applied practice in economic policy issues. He has extensive worldwide experience in public expenditure planning, public expenditure management reform and poverty reduction working with multi–lateral and bilateral agencies as well as individual Governments. This has involved both long- and short-term assignments. He has been Team Leader on many consultancy assignments in the areas of public finance, public expenditure planning, public expenditure analysis and budgeting, including MTEFs. Mr Short’s work also encompasses tax policy and administration, customs reform, balance of payments issues and trade, investment and industry policy as well as private sector development. He has widespread experience in donor co–ordination and linking donor support to government budgetary and financial systems. This experience has also been complemented by Mr Short’s academic research work and teaching.
John Short has been involved in the design, implementation and evaluation of MTEFs in Rwanda, Sierra Leone, Kenya, Albania, Afghanistan, Georgia, and Moldova as part of his work in PFM. In his work in Albania, he has worked with the Parliamentary Economic and Finance Committee and has taken the Committee on a study tour to Westminster. He has also extensive experience in resource envelop issues and has worked with the Ministry of Finance in Albania in developing that aspect of its MTEF, and has also carried out reviews of tax policy in many countries in the context of revenue estimation.
John Short has developed and used Public Expenditure Reviews as an effective vehicle to link sectoral and national policy (such as PRSP) to the planning and budget process as well as incorporating donor funding (both on budget and off budget) in an overall sectoral resource envelop. He has been involved in developing costing methodology for PRSP. His work with Line Ministries in the Albanian MTEF has been involved in linking expenditure and policy.
John Short has carried out several assignments using the PEFA methodology and has been the team leader on the Moldova (2006 and 2008), Serbia (2010) and Sierra Leone (2007 and 2010 (CG and SN) PEFAs as well as proving guidance to the Kosovo 2009 CG PEFA and 2010/11 SN PEFA. He has attended training on the application of PEFA methodology delivered by the PEFA Secretariat. His application of PEFA and Fiduciary Risk Assessments that he has carried out for DFID and the EC covers the whole of the budget process from planning and budget formulation, through budget execution and internal audit to accounting and external audit.
John Short has extensive experience in donor supported PFM projects. He has been part of the supervisory mission to Georgia on behalf of DFID, and has carried out a mid-term review of the Moldova PFM project for the MoF and was part of the REPIM Team that evaluated the PFM reform project in Zambia.
John Short has been at the forefront of developing methodologies for inter-regional public financial flows in the UK and has published a number of books and journal articles on this subject.
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Martin Johnson has substantial experience of public finance management (PFM) reform, monitoring and evaluation gained through both resident long-term assignments and short-term projects in transition and developing countries. Mr Johnson is currently leading the evaluation of a five year PFM reform programme in Zambia and has recently completed fiduciary risk assessments (FRAs) at federal, provincial and sector level on behalf of DFID in Pakistan. Mr Johnson directed REPIM’s DFID-funded three-year support to the Government of Albania for strengthening public expenditure management and previously managed the prior DFID project for three years. Subsequently he was Director of REPIM’s project supporting the Medium Term Budget Program, public investment and monitoring in Albania.
Mr Johnson led the PEFA evaluation in Rwanda, with responsibility for design of the evaluation approach and much of the technical analysis as well as quality control and report preparation. Mr Johnson has carried out a range of national, sub-national and sector fiduciary risk assessments (FRAs) on behalf of DFID using the PEFA methodology as the basis for these over the last several years. He has evaluated a new approach to strategic budgeting in Serbia and since 2003 has carried out monitoring and evaluation of DFID’s MTBF support to the Government of Pakistan. Mr Johnson has advised the Government of Romania on aspects of PFM reform and has carried out a range of PFM diagnostic assignments in Africa, including establishing the groundwork for introducing MTEFs in Sierra Leone and Rwanda.
Mr Johnson spent two years as a Senior Economist in the Budget Department of the Ministry of Finance in Uganda under the Overseas Development Institute Fellowship Scheme and two and a half years as a Policy Adviser to the Government of the Marshall Islands with particular responsibility for PFM issues. |
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Paul Harnett has extensive worldwide experience in the design and application of budget reform both at the central and line ministry level. He has developed and used Public Expenditure Reviews as an effective vehicle to link sectoral and national policy (such as PRSP) to the planning and budget process as well as incorporating donor funding (both on budget and off budget) in an overall sectoral resource envelope. His work with Line Ministries has involved linking expenditure and policy. In particular his intensive support to the strengthening of Public Finance Management in Albania over the past 4 years has focused on this link, firstly working with the Ministry of Finance and then the line ministries of agriculture, health and transport. He has recently written hands-on Guides for the Ministries of Interior and Foreign Affairs for their budget preparation process. Each Guide is designed to facilitate the MTBP preparation in each line ministry and includes practical explanations, with regards to defining policy goals, objectives, standards, outputs & activities and, clear examples of core performance indicators related to the policy area/programme.
Paul Harnett has attended training on the application of PEFA methodology for practitioners and the PEFA train-the-trainers course delivered by the PEFA Secretariat, as well as carrying out PEFA and delivering PEFA training.
He has been involved in the design and evaluation of budget support for donors. |
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Sharon Hanson-Cooper is a Public Sector Accountant with experience in analysing and evaluating financial procedures and systems with further qualifications in Development Management. She worked in senior positions in a UK local authority and has more than 30 years professional experience which includes 10 years in developing and transitional countries. She is experienced in project design, review and implementation. She has undertaken a number of assessment missions and has extensive experience of managing multi disciplinary teams of senior legal and financial experts.
Sharon has extensive experience of EU processes and EU pre accession requirements and benchmarks in the field of public finance, governance & anti corruption. Sharon has attended a PEFA assessment training course and a ‘Train the Trainers’ course in June 2008. Sharon was responsible for assessment of PFM systems applying the PEFA assessment model in Jordan and Sierra Leone. She was responsible for significant numbers of the budget cycle indicators in particular, those related to control during budget execution, internal audit, internal control systems, accounting systems and reporting, together with the parliamentary scrutiny and follow up of external audit reports. In addition she assessed PFM systems and public sector bodies in the UK using UK National Audit Office and Audit Commission assessment methodologies based on a structured indicator & assessment methodology similar to the PEFA approach. Sharon has worked on internal and external audit as well as governance issues in the Balkans as well as in Asia and Africa. |
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| Simon Stone combines a strong academic background in micro- and macro-economics with a broad working experience as an economist in the UK, Africa, the CIS, Balkans and Asia. Mr Stone has extensive experience in a wide range of macroeconomic modelling, Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) and public financial management and reform issues. His experience has been built on a wide range of diverse experience in both the private sector and in developing country public sector institutions. He has taken the lead on the review and rewriting of the Organic Budget Law in Albania and the associated procedures for implementing the annual budget. Simon Stone has worked as an economist and corporate finance executive in the City of London, covering the operations of international financial markets, country risk analysis, and industry research, as well as project appraisal and the design and negotiations of financial structures for management/leveraged buy-outs, public listings, and venture capital start-up projects in Great Britain and Europe. |
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| Associate Consultants |
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| Chris Lightfoot, an independent consultant associated with REPIM, has over thirty years experience of consultancy assignments in both a long-term resident capacity and short-term inputs. His work in especially challenging cultural and social situations includes his leading role in the design and implementation of a major structural and public sector reform program in the Federated States of Micronesia where his strategies and approach were focussed around consensus building among political, technical and community leaders. Mr Lightfoot has extensive experience in the analysis of institutional systems and the reform of government operations. He has a great deal of experience in institutional development and the sector reform process, particularly in agriculture and fisheries. His work in the Central Planning Office of Fiji during the post 1987 coup economic reform process had a substantial impact on the economy of Fiji. In addition he has successfully undertaken major institutional reviews in Australia, Tonga, Papua New Guinea, Kiribati, Fiji and Mongolia. Chris Lightfoot has worked extensively on donor coordination and the application of the Paris Declaration on aid harmonisation in Indonesia, Laos, Vietnam, Philippines and Guyana. He has attended training on the application of PEFA methodology delivered by the PEFA Secretariat. |
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| John Blissett has been working in a variety of areas of Information Technology since 1977, starting as a programmer on leaving University. Since then his time has been spent working in a variety of roles, including applications development, user training, software and hardware support, consultancy and management. Mr Blissett’s extensive IT experience includes systems analysis, design and development across a wide area of applications and geographies in both the commercial and public sectors. He has recently developed the budget preparation software to accompany the new procedures manual that REPIM has developed as part of the Strengthening Public Expenditure Management project in Albania that covers policy formulation, links plans to policies, and allocates expenditures to input activities and programmes to achieve the outputs related to the expenditure. The software provides for expenditure and output reporting and monitoring. He has also developed budget execution software that allows budget transfers to be expedited efficiently. |
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| Jolanda Trebicka has excellent understanding and experience of transition economies, as a result of 19 years experience in dealing with the transition reform processes, and of 6 years experience with the World Bank in the area of support to public sector reforms in Albania as well as working on EC and DFID projects. She has particular knowledge and experience in areas of public administration and institutional reform; anti-corruption reform; public finance; budget planning and execution; aid coordination; monitoring & evaluation, and assessment of donor’s funded project/programs; programming, co-ordination, management and implementation; project cycle management (project drafting, implementation and monitoring) participatory and accountability mechanism program management and operations procedures and cross-border cooperation. |
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| Jorida Tabaku, an associate of REPIM, is an internationally qualified graduate from UK, US and Albania universities. She is a consultant on the Strengthening Public Expenditure Management programme working with Parliamentarians on scrutiny of the budget, training on policy and planning and working with line ministries in the application in budget formulation. She teaches in the Management Department of the University of Tirana and serves as Executive Director of Students in Free Enterprise in Albania. Jorida Tabaku also carries out research in SMEs and Financial Management in Higher Education. |
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Margaret Moodie has extensive experience of providing policy advice to governments throughout a civil service career (23 years) in UK and when acting as consultant to overseas Ministers and civil servants (8+ years). Her wide-ranging experience covers the whole of the policy cycle but with a special emphasis on implementation issues and the building of institutional capacity. This experience comes from work on management and implementation projects in Departments of Health and Social Security in UK; the Consensus programme; several projects in transitional countries; and professional and academic study. In particular, she has detailed knowledge of the operation of planning and implementing social policy. Her work in this regards has involved explicit attention to issues of sustainable finance and the financial consequences of devolution and the development of ministerial budgets to reflect policy and plans.
Over the past 5 years Margaret Moodie has worked in developing the budget formulation function in line ministries in Albania particularly the Ministry of Labour and Social Welfare. She has recently written hands-on Guides for the Ministries of Justice and Labour and Social Welfare for their budget preparation process. Each Guide is designed to facilitate the MTBP preparation in each line ministry and includes practical explanations, with regards to defining policy goals, objectives, standards, outputs & activities and, clear examples of core performance indicators related to the policy area/programme. As well she has the lead on producing Internal Rules and Procedures for Ministries in conjunction with the overall MTBP Manual.
As a University lecturer of courses in Management of Change, Current Themes in Public Management, Policy Analysis, Managing the Public Services, Health Service Reform and course director for MA in Social Security Management, specialist MA in public policy and management for practitioners in social security (curriculum design, course management, recruitment), she has wide experience in transmitting knowledge.
Ms. Moodie has sound knowledge of EU social policy gained while working for the Consensus programme and for the Action Centre for Europe and, especially, project work in accession countries. She has experience of working with a wide range of professional colleagues and excellent drafting skills. |
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Mauro Napodano has significant experience in Public Finance Management, with over 20-year experience, providing advisory services to Governments in developing and transition countries on Medium Term Expenditure Framework (MTEF) and Sector Wide Approach (SWAP). He has attended training on the application of PEFA methodology delivered by the PEFA Secretariat.
He has lead local teams in programme policy and expenditure reviews and public investment analysis in Egypt, Ghana, Brazil, Georgia, Mongolia, Azerbaijan and Albania Sectors included education, health, environment and tourism. In 2009 he was: (i) in Ghana as PFM expert in the EC Mid-Term Review of EC Strategy, focusing on donor budget support; (i) in Egypt where he piloted the introduction of an MTEF in Ministry of Education, helping the Ministry of Finance to define a work-plan for the roll out of the exercise to all ministries. In Albania he has recently written hands-on Guides for the Ministries of Education and Youth, Sport and Tourism for their budget preparation process. Each Guide is designed to facilitate the MTBP preparation in each line ministry and includes practical explanations, with regards to defining policy goals, objectives, standards, outputs & activities and, clear examples of core performance indicators related to the policy area/programme. |
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Mike Dowden has over 20 years experience of work as a practitioner and consultant on local economic and regional development initiatives; this work has an emphasis on labour market economics and HRD development issues; SME development and competitiveness issues, including cluster development. Mr Dowden’s work has also included the establishment of regional / SME development agencies, together with consultancy support to their management and administrative structures.
This range of work has been undertaken at policy development level, including the development of Operational Programmes and other regional and local strategy initiatives together with their implementation, monitoring and evaluation. Mike Dowden is used to working with government ministries, often at deputy minister level, with mayors and other members of regional and local administrations together with the owner or manager of SMEs. His work is built around understanding and relating to clients and their needs and to those whom the client is responsible for.
Mike Dowden’s work has been undertaken across the European Union, in EU accession countries, Middle East, Southern Africa and in other transition economies. |
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| Dr. Pirouz Hamidian-Rad has over 30 years experience in economics and finance, management and team building, accounting and auditing, international relations and international negotiation. During 15 years with the World Bank (1983-1998), Dr. Hamidian-Rad worked extensively on the design, formulation, negotiation, and implementation of economic, financial, and technical assistance programs and projects as well as on medium-term development strategies and aid mobilization. Dr. Hamidian-Rad has led numerous missions to client countries and conducted sensitive negotiations for the design and implementation of the World Bank-funded operations. These projects have involved extensive experience in dealing with heads of governments, senior cabinet ministers, public service officials, and community stakeholders including unions, university students, the NGOs, and the private sector. During his tenure at the World Bank and as a private consultant, Dr. Hamidian-Rad has managed eight structural adjustment/financial sector reform operations, two technical assistance projects, eight country economic reports, four country assistance strategy reports, four public expenditure reviews, three financial engineering workouts, a commercial debt-buyback operation, two bridge-financing operations, four debt-rescheduling packages, five donor/consultative group meetings, and a judicial reform operation. From 1998 to July 1999 Dr. Hamidian-Rad was the Chief Economic Advisor to the Government of Papua New Guinea, during which time he designed and provided advice to public officials to ensure the success of the implementation of the National Government’s economic and financial reform program. This program included macroeconomic and fiscal reforms, civil service reform, privatization, trade and industrial policies reform and reform of the financial sector including the country’s first-ever sovereign credit rating and international bond issue. Pirouz was also active during August 2002-June 2010 in Afghanistan’s reconstruction effort, providing technical advice and training to several government departments, including Ministry of Education, on policy formulation, project design, proposal writing, project finance, budget formulation and aid-coordination. He is fluent in English, Farsi (mother tongue), and Tajik, and is familiar with Turkish, Arabic, French, and Spanish |
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Russell Craig an independent consultant associated with REPIM, has had nineteen years development experience advising on public sector policy, management and organisational reforms after a career in Australia as an academic and senior manager in the civil service including two positions in corporate planning. He has worked with a number of key ministries including Finance, Education, Health, Agriculture, and Lands. He worked extensively in Timor Leste in the period 2003-4 as part of the World Bank managed multi sector support program, mainly in the health and education sectors, including the development of the health sector investment program and with health ministries in a variety of roles in South East Asia, the Middle East and Africa. His experience covers public sector finance [including Public Expenditure Reviews and Medium Term Expenditure Frameworks], capacity building, functional reviews, planning, aid co-ordination, staff development and management systems, poverty and national household socio-economic surveys.
Most recently he has specialised in high level strategic planning and coordination and public expenditure management. He has been a Team Leader of large and small scale projects building capacity in Cambodia, The Gambia, Montenegro, Uganda and Papua New Guinea. He has had intensive inputs in institutional development and project planning in Cambodia, Laos, Gambia, Namibia and Uganda. Recent experience includes sector wide approaches and planning, Public Expenditure Reviews and Medium Term Expenditure Frameworks, capacity building, functional reviews, health and education sectors planning and finance, aid co–ordination, staff development and management systems, poverty and national household socio–economic surveys. |
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Saimir Sallaku has been consultant on REPIM’s Strengthening the Budget Process projects (SPEM2 and 3) and on REPIM’s project Supporting the Ministry of Finance, Line Ministries and the Department for Strategy and Donor Coordination for Strategic Plans Development, the Implementation of Medium Term Budget Program, Public Investment and Monitoring with the Ministry of Finance in Albania. He had significant inputs into the preparation and application of the Programme Policy Review and Programme Expenditure and Investment Planning procedures working with line ministry staff. He has been involved in designing and delivering workshops and on-the-job trainings for Ministry of Finance and other line ministry staff such as Labour and Social Affairs, Health, Education, Agriculture, Interior, Defence, Public Works and Transport and Foreign Affairs. He has contributed to the preparation of key documentation supporting the organisation and management of the MTBP process and has provided continuous support by participating in MoF’s MTBP Secretariat process. Other work has included: support to design of Programme Policy Review and Public Expenditure Planning IT platform; participation in the Government’s Technical Secretariat process for the design of a new foreign aid management system, including contributing to preparation of Technical Secretariat technical papers. Under the current project he has delivered inputs into MTBP Document Redesign; Preparation of GDB Guidebook; Training of General Directorate of Budget and Training of Programme Management Teams and Policy Advice to General Directorate of Budget.
As well as his public sector experience in budgeting, Saimir has considerable private sector development experience. Saimir is the founder of the first SIFE team in Albania in 1996 and acts in the role of Country Coordinator for SIFE Albania since 2001. He has considerable experience of the privatisation process and business development in Albania. As well he is a on the Board of Directors of a Commercial bank and serves on the regulatory body that supervises non bank financial institutions in Albania. |
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Sotiraq Guga combines his original studies in economics and finance complemented by an MBA with an excellent understanding of transition economies, as a result of 20 years hands-on experience in the transition reform processes both as a civil servant and a consultant. His consultancy experience has been gained by eight years in many countries and different assistance programmes for European Commission, World Bank, UNDP, and DFID particularly in Central and Eastern Europe with a wider exposure in the Balkans region. Mr Guga has proven successful expertise in public management; public policy and the strengthening of institutions for economic management; public finance, budgetary issues, public investment programming; public administration reform and institutional reorganization; aid coordination; strategic planning and policy analysis; project cycle management, programming, monitoring and evaluation; training needs assessment.
In REPIM’s support to the Ministry of Finance in Albania, he led the advice on investment planning and developed the procedures for investment in the budget process. He has recently written hands-on Guides for the Ministries of Defence and Health for their budget preparation process. Each Guide is designed to facilitate the MTBP preparation in each line ministry and includes practical explanations, with regards to defining policy goals, objectives, standards, outputs & activities and, clear examples of core performance indicators related to the policy area/programme.
In addition to his direct PFM work, Mr Guga has worked on external assistance management and currently is support the Department of Strategies and Donor Coordination in the Council of Ministers in Albania on integrating external assistance into the government’s planning and budgeting systems including appropriate MIS in line with the Paris Declaration principles. |
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| Uuganbileg Erdene is an experienced and qualified applied economist who has worked extensively with projects supported by the World Bank, Asian Development Bank and UNDP. Her experience encompasses Economic Policy, Poverty Analysis, Labour and Population Economics and Development Economics as well as Institutional Management and Reform. |
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Sybi Hida has more than ten years of experience in public finance in transition countries. He has an accomplished career within the Ministry of Finance of Albania, and he worked for two years at the International Monetary Fund, in Washington DC. His main areas of expertise include macroeconomic analysis and forecasting—financial programming, medium term budget program (MTBP), debt sustainability analysis, tax policy, public investment, and civil service reform. In March 2002, He was appointed to work in the budget department and to cooperate with DFID consultants for changing the budget preparation and presentation; from the institutional budget to a program budgeting as the first step for the Ministry of Finance to design a Medium Term Budget Program. Mr. Hida was a member of the working groups that designed the Integrated Planning System (IPS), a set of operating principles to ensure that government policy planning and implementation take place in a coherent, efficient and integrated manner, which was adopted by the Government in November 2005.
Mr. Hida, has a great deal of experience in teaching and training civil servants and civil society. He has been teaching economics at the University of Tirana since 1999. He was a regular trainer at Training Institute of Public Administration of Albania, from 2003 to 2007.
He is the co-author of “A Citizen’s Guide to the Budget” and author of “Budget Citizen Guide for Municipality of Permet and Commune of Petran.” In addition, Mr. Hida has attended a number of professional courses on public policy organized by IMF, World Bank, and other well-known institutions. |
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