ACCA explores the guidelines, new ideas for public sector professionalising.

ACCA's virtual public sector conference explored the challenges and the solutions that face public sector financial professionals as they work towards transforming the public sector. Such a task would be a challenge at any time but it is made significantly harder by a combination of war, high rates of inflation and a pressing climate challenge.

Accountancy is at the center of public sector transformation. Finance professionals need the right skills to improve financial management and drive policy and spending decisions. New thinking in the public sector has never been more important and the conference heard about ACCA's recently published guides on professionalizing the public sector, launched with IFAC on 18 November 2022, and green budgeting. Both are strong examples of the new thinking required.

The conference also heard about the unenviable choices facing finance leaders in the public sector. In the opening keynote Public Purse Prioritisation - public finance during a cost of living crisis Vladyslaw Rashkovan, alternate executive director at the International Monetary Fund and former deputy governor of the National Bank of Ukraine, illustrated how tough spending choices were in a war zone, with trade-offs between funding weapons or protecting citizens. He said: "Many hard choices exist over budget allocation. While slogans like building back better are great, winter is coming, and people cannot live on the streets. So, for donors and government, the hard reality may bring unpleasant tradeoffs between the speed and quality of reconstructing of places where people are housed."

Vladyslav added that there is a high and increasing demand for finance specialists to help rebuild Ukraine in multiple sectors. In the conference session, he set out 12 points that finance...