Italy’s State Gender Responsive Budget: Lessons Learned From Eight Years of Implementation

The Italycompletion of the State budget reform has introduced some tools into the Italian public accounting system that have expanded the more properly accounting aspects, including the gender responsive budgeting. In the national context, the experience had already been tested at the local level, although not in a structured way. The gender responsive budgeting is coordinated by the Ministry of Economy and Finance, General State Accounting Office, and represents an institutional activity of the General Inspectorate of the Budget. The process of the gender responsive budgeting has been defined through an annual circular, which contains updated guidelines and instructions, sent to all State budget administrations. In addition to their elaborations required by the circular, an Annual Report to Parliament is made, which contains a wide range of information on gender gap indicators in various national contexts, a review of legislation on the subject, an examination of the main tax policies, and thematic insights edited by subject matter experts. Eight years of work experience have allowed for a progressive improvement in the information made available with the Annual Report to Parliament; there is still room for improvement that can be achieved through the training of the officials in charge, support to administrations to adopt the gender mainstreaming approach, and the structured and conscious adoption of good practices in the evaluation of public policies together with the enhancement of the data they have available, in addition to those coming from qualified statistical and administrative sources.