Mrs Sophia Kesewa Ampofo Kusi, Principal Health Planner of the Policy Planning, Monitoring and Evaluation Division of the Ghana Health Service (GHS), has stressed the need for programme-based planning and budgeting to ensure efficient utilization of funds.

She said Programme-specific planning and budgeting on government funds allocated to the health sector would help ensure effective monitoring of resources at the facility level to achieve intended objective of providing quality healthcare delivery in the country.

Mrs Kusi made the call at a Citizen Input Forum on Budget Monitoring and Tracking in Kumasi.

It was jointly organized by Send-Ghana Foundation and Resource Link Foundation, both NGOs, with financial support from Oxfam and Trust Africa.

Civil Society groups, farmer-based organizations as well as officials from the Ministries of Health, Education and Agriculture, attended the forum.

It afforded the participants an opportunity to share views on the government allocation of financial resources to their sectors and budgeting processes with the view of identifying gaps, challenges and the way forward.

Mrs Kusi said accurate data collection and report writing was necessary to determine duties performed at any point in time, while effective monitoring and evaluation was very important to ensure proper accountability of resources.

Mrs Kusi called on budget officers to always update their knowledge and skills to ensure that they discharged their duties efficiently.