CHILE

Chile is a representative democratic republic. The President of Chile is at the same time head of state and head of government. Legislative power is vested in both the government and the bicameral National Congress (Congreso Nacional), which consists of the Senate (Senado, upper house) and the Chamber of Deputies (Cámara de Diputados, lower house). Since 2015, after a reform that replaced the electoral binomial system with a more proportional one, the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate have 155 and 50 members respectively.

The 1980 Constitution defines the Republic of Chile as a unitary, democratic and presidential State whose administration is functionally and territorially decentralised, or deconcentrated as the case may be, in accordance with the law (art. 3 of the Constitution). In a plebiscite held in October 2020, Chileans voted in favour of a new Constitution, for the drafting of witch a Constituent Convention was mandated, made up of 155 men and women in gender parity and with seats reserved for indigenous peoples; the final drafting proposal for the New Constitution was presented on July 5, 2022. In a final referendum that took place on September 4, 2022, the proposal for a new constitution was rejected.

Since the late 2000s, the Chilean government has pursued important decentralisation and regionalisation reforms. At the regional level, the deliberative power is in the hands of a regional council, whose members (from 14 to 34 depending on the population size) have been directly elected every four years, since 2014. Regional councils have a normative, resolutive and supervisory role within the sphere of competences regional governments. Laws N 20.990/2017 and N 21.073/2018 transformed the “mixed” regional system (both deconcentrated and decentralised) that was in place since 1992, into a full self-government system, establishing the direct election of the regional executive (governors) by popular vote every four years. The first 16 elected regional governors, who preside the regional council, took office in July 2021. In parallel, Law N 21.074 of 2018 transferred responsibilities from the national government to the new self-governing regions on land use planning, economic and social development and culture. The Inter-ministerial Committee of Decentralisation supports and advises the President of the Republic on the competences to be transferred, that can result from presidential initiative or upon request from the regional government. The newly elected Governor will be accompanied by a Presidential Delegate, the latter are appointed by the President of the Republic for each region and have as their function and attribution the exercise of matters concerning internal government, public security, emergencies and coordination of services operating in the territory of each region.

The Ministerial Regional Secretaries (SEREMIS) are deconcentrated entities representing each ministry at the regional level. The Ministerial Regional Secretary collaborates with the presidential delegate coordinating the management of public services in the respective territories. The law for the transfer of resources at the regional level is still under discussion in Congress.

At the local level, since 1992, communes are governed by a mayor and a municipal council, elected directly for a renewable period of four years. In 1999, a constitutional law extended municipal powers and responsibilities in the field of economic development, environment, planning, equal opportunities, etc. The municipality is advised by a Community Council of Civil Society Organizations (COSOC), made up of representatives from relevant community activities and organisations.

Sectoral ministries and public agencies play an important role in policy design and implementation. While several line ministries implement policies relevant or with impact for subnational governments, it is the Sub-secretariat for Regional and Administrative Development (SUBDERE) of the Ministry of Interior and Public Security that is in charge of promoting and conducting decentralisation reforms and ensuring an effective transfer of powers and responsibilities in the political, economic and administrative spheres to regional governments and municipalities. SUBDERE also collects, processes and disseminates information related to municipal financial management, personnel administration and service provision, through the Sistema Nacional de Información Municipal (SINIM). Besides line ministries and SUBDERE, national public agencies have also developed links with subnational governments, such as the Chilean Economic Development Agency (Corporación de Fomento de la Producción - CORFO). The National Urban Development Council (Consejo Nacional de Desarrollo Urbano - CNDU) is a consultative and advisory body that makes proposals for reforms and follows implementation and compliance with the National Urban Policy.

TERRITORIAL ORGANISATION
MUNICIPAL LEVEL	INTERMEDIATE LEVEL	REGIONAL LEVEL	TOTAL NUMBER OF SNGs (2021)
345 municipalities (municipalidades)		16 regions (regiones)
Average municipal size: 55 409 inh.
345		16	361

OVERALL DESCRIPTION: Chile is a unitary country with a two-tier system of subnational government. The subnational organisation is defined in Chapter XIV of the 1980 Constitution, entitled “Government and Interior State Administration”. Article 110 provides that the territory of the Republic shall be divided into regions, provinces and comunas (managed by municipalities). There are 345 municipalities and 346 communes as the municipality of Cabo de Hornos administers two communes, Cabo de Hornos and Antártica..

Chile is also divided into 56 provinces for administrative purposes; 40 provinces have a provincial presidential delegate (who replaces the former provincial governor), appointed by the President of the Republic since July 2021, as a deconcentrated representative of the Ministry of Interior and Public Security.

REGIONAL LEVEL: Administrative regions were created in 1974, grouping 25 provinces. Administrative regions became self-governing entities with Law N 20.990 of January 2017, and the first regional elections took place in 2021. Executive power lies with the regional governor and the regional council (consejo regional - CORE) chaired by the regional governor. Law N 20.990 also stipulates that the former figure of Intendent (Intendente) is now called Regional Presidential Delegate, who is appointed by the President of the Republic and represents the Ministry of Interior and Public Security and, as such, is responsible for public security, emergencies and the co-ordination of public services.

Regions range from 103 158 inhabitants in the Aysén Region to 7 112 808 inhabitants in the Metropolitan Region of Santiago. Degree of urbanisation has increased over years from 83.5% in 1992 to 87.8% in 2017. Over three quarters of the population lives in cities of more than 50 000 inhabitants and their respective commuting areas (functional urban areas, FUAs), in line with the OECD average. The share of population in FUAs with more than 500 000 people is 51%, lower than the OECD average of 60%. All regions have experienced an important increase of immigrants – since 2010, immigration has risen by 324%. In 2021, 65.2% of total immigrants live in the Metropolitan region, followed by 8.4% in Antofagasta and 5.9% in Tarapacá, in the north of the country.

Between 2008 and 2018, regional economic disparities showed the largest drop among OECD countries; the region with the lowest GDP per capita in the country, Araucanía, grew by 3.2% per year in terms of GDP per capita, while in Antofagasta, the richest region, GDP per capita declined by 0.5% per year during the same period. However, Chile still has among the highest levels of territorial disparities in the OECD, with a concentration of high-value economic activities in few regions due to the importance of mining-intensive activities.

While the National Urban Development Policy (Política Nacional de Desarrollo Urbano – PNDU) establishes the need to create governance bodies at the metropolitan scale – in particular for Santiago, Valparaíso (Gran Valparaíso), and Concepción (Gran Concepción) – this has not yet been implemented. The Law N 21.074 of 2018 prescribes the creation of Metropolitan Areas – with special competences such as transport, public investment, environment, among others. The details for the creation of these areas will be described in a regulation that has not yet been issued.

MUNICIPAL LEVEL: In 1992, Law N 19.130, which reformed the Organic Law of Municipalities (Law N 18.695), established municipalities as a public law corporation, with a legal personality, its own patrimony and autonomy. Its functions are to promote the economic, social and cultural development of the commune with the participation of the local community. It is led by the mayor and the Municipal Council. In addition, the municipality has a consultative body, the Community Council of Civil Society Organizations (Consejo Comunal de Organizaciones de la Sociedad Civil - COSOC), which aims at allowing the participation of the community. This 1992 reform was followed in 1995 by the Law No. 19.388 which modified the Municipal Revenue Act, in particular the territorial tax and in turn the Municipal Common Fund, which is a solidarity redistribution mechanism of income between municipalities.

Since 2013, a municipal reform transfered more responsibilities to the 345 municipalities. The reform aimed at providing themwith the tools, capacities, financial resources and legitimacy to improve their autonomy and performance. In this sense, Law N 20.922 (Plantas Law) of 2016 provided more freedom and flexibility to the mayor to manage municipal staff according to municipal needs in terms of workforce and qualifications. Municipalities, on average, are large compared to the OECD (55 184 inhabitants in Chile vs 10 254 inhabitants in the OECD). Regarding the number of municipalities by population size category, Chile also ranks high among OECD countries for having very few small municipalities, i.e. fewer than 2 000 inhabitants (5% vs 28% in the OECD). By contrast, 48% of Chilean municipalities have more than 20 000 inhabitants, which is significantly higher than the OECD average of 33%.

HORIZONTAL COOPERATION: The Constitutional amendment adopted in 2009 (Law No. 20.346) enables the formal and voluntary association of municipalities and Law No. 20.527 of 2011 allows them to become private not-for-profit corporations. Municipal associations can obtain legal personality under private law, and may form or integrate private non-profit corporations or foundations whose purpose is the promotion and dissemination of art, culture and sport, or the promotion of municipal public works and productive development. Since 2011, municipal associations can have their own capital, enter into financial commitments, compete for funding and receive grants or subsidies from the central government. The most important challenge faced by municipal associations has been their financing. Municipal associations are financed by member fees intended to cover operational costs. Associations can also access public funding through tendering processes but these remain very limited.

According to Law N 18.695 (LOCMUN), municipalities have six exclusive functions (Art. 3 LOCUN) and non-exclusive responsibilities in 13 areas (Art. 4 LOCMUN), which are uniform across all municipalities. New tasks are regularly given to municipalities in various areas; however, service delivery is mainly carried out by deconcentrated state territorial entities, state-managed private concessions, and partially by subnational governments. In November 2017, the New Public Education Law (Ley de Nueva Educación Pública) recentralised the administration and management of public schools, transferring the competences from municipalities to the Ministry of Education, through a network of 70 Local Education Services (Servicios Locales de Educacion), to be implemented completely by 2030.

Regional government responsibilities are defined in the Organic Constitutional Law N 19.175. They include approving the regional development plan and regional investments funded with the resources that are delivered annually to each of the regional governments for the development of their social and cultural priorities and the promotion of productive activities. Law N 21.074 of 2018 transferred new responsibilities from the central to the regional level on territorial planning, economic development, social and cultural development, and infrastructure and transport. It also created a mechanism through which regions can ask for further competences to be transferred to them. This process will be activated in 2022 after the evaluation of the responsibilities that have already been transferred.

Main responsibility sectors and sub-sectors
SECTORS AND SUB-SECTORS	Regions (if relevant)	Intermediate level (if relevant)	Municipal level
1. General public services (administration)	Internal administration; Municipal advice		Internal administration
2. Public order and safety
3. Economic affairs / transports	Regional development; Rural roads; Land management		Local development; Tourism; Local transport regulation; Traffic regulations (shared); Economic development
4. Environment protection			Conservation of flora and fauna
5. Housing and community amenities	Regional Planning; Inter-municipal plan (shared)		Municipal zoning plan; Urbanism and construction; Social housing (shared)
6. Health			Basic public health; Hygiene services; Sanitary infrastructure (shared)
7. Culture & Recreation	Social and cultural development		Culture, recreation, sports (shared)
8. Education			Primary education (shared)
9. Social Welfare

Scope of fiscal data: Municipalities. The 2019 subnational finance data available for Chile does not yet include regions, as they still had no autonomous budget.

SNA 2008

Availability of fiscal data: Medium

Quality/reliability of fiscal data: Medium

GENERAL INTRODUCTION: Chilean subnational governments expenditure and revenue official data only reflect municipal data as regions do not yet have a financial existence distinct from that of the central level.

At the municipal level, Decree Law No. 3063 of 1979 and its complementary provision regulates municipal revenues. SUBDERE is responsible for the administration of the horizontal equalisation scheme, the Municipal Common Fund (Fondo Común Municipal – FCM). Municipalities are constrained in terms of staff resources and public services management. Policy design and implementation are still largely defined by the centre in a top-down process.

The administration of regional governments’ funds is regulated by Decree Law No. 1263 of 1975 and its complementary provisions. Currently, the Annual Budget Law considers two distinct budget programmes for each regional government: one for operational expenses and one for regional investments. In addition, regional governments can access the National Fund for Regional Development (Fondo Nacional de Desarrollo Regional – FNDR), administered by SUBDERE, to fund regional investments, as well as the Innovation Fund for Competitiveness (Fondo de Innovación para la Competitivodad – FIC). While regional governments still do not have an own budget, the current administration will develop a new law on regional revenues in 2022, as part of the tax reform, that will be discussed in the Congress for its future approval.

Subnational government expenditure by economic classification
	Dollars PPP / inhabitant	% GDP	% general government	% subnational government
Total expenditure	979	3.9%	13.4%	100%
Inc. current expenditure	922	3.7%	14.3%	94.2%
Compensation of employees	554	2.2%	29.4%	56.6%
Intermediate consumption	224	1%	29.1%	23%
Social expenditure	8	0%	0.3%	0.9%
Subsidies and current transfers	134	0.5%	17%	13.7%
Financial charges	0	0%	0.1%	0%
Others	0	0%	0%	0%
Incl. capital expenditure	57	0.2%	6.5%	5.8%
Capital transfers	2	0%	0.6%	0.2%
Direct investment (or GFCF)	55	0.2%	10.9%	5.6%

EXPENDITURE: Chile ranks among OECD countries in which the weight of subnational government spending in GDP and public expenditure is the lowest (alongside Costa Rica, Ireland, Turkey, and Greece). Chilean local government expenditure represented 3.9% of GDP and 13.4% of total public expenditure in 2020, compared to the OECD average of 17.1% and 36.6% respectively. Over half of expenditure is dedicated to staff expenditure, mainly in the education and health sectors.

DIRECT INVESTMENT: As it is the case for subnational government expenditure, capital expenditure also only reflects investment conducted by municipalities. The share of capital expenditure fell from 45% in 1990 to 6.5% in 2020 – capital expenditure as a share of subnational government expenditure (5.8%) was well behind the OECD average (13.5%) in 2020. It is important to underline that an important share of public investment at the municipal level is directly financed by line ministries and implemented by SEREMIs on behalf of municipalities. Direct investment is very limited as a share of subnational government expenditure, GDP and total public investment. Chile ranks last in the OECD in terms of subnational government involvement in public investment. Local public investment accounted for 0.2% of GDP and 10.9% of public investment, versus respectively 1.4% and 43.2% on average in OECD countries when considering only local governments. This low level of local public investment, despite huge local needs, reflects the extent to which public action is centralised, and the difficulties for municipalities to generate self-financing for investments. Local governments can access financing mechanisms from Public-Private Partnerships and international cooperation funds for urban development.

ⓘ No detailed data available for this country

Municipal budgets are structured in three main sectors: municipal services, education and health. The municipal sector (which encompasses internal management, municipal activities, community services, social programmes, recreational programmes and cultural programmes), accounted for most part of the budget, followed by education and healthcare. Spending related to education and basic public services are for the main part dedicated to staff expenditure as municipalities pay teachers on behalf of the central government. In the health and education sectors, subsidies from the central government are often insufficient to cover the needs of many rural municipalities, which therefore have to supplement with their own local resources.

Subnational government revenue by category
	Dollars PPP / inhabitant	% GDP	% general government	% subnational government
Total revenue	1024	4.1%	18.6%	100%
Tax revenue	420	1.7%	9.3%	41%
Grants and subsidies	575	2.3%	-	56.1%
Tariffs and fees	27	0.1%	-	2.6%
Income from assets	3	0%	-	0.3%
Other revenues	0	0%	-	0%

OVERALL DESCRIPTION: Chilean municipalities receive revenues from central government grants, own-tax revenues and, to a lesser extent, tariffs and fees. Grants and subsidies represent a significant (56.1%) and growing share of subnational revenues, slightly above the OECD average when only considering local governments (53.3%) in 2020. This reflects the high level of dependency of municipalities vis-a-vis the central government. Most of those grants are earmarked transfers to fund specific sectoral policies. Local tax revenues are the second source of municipal revenue, accounting for 41% of subnational government revenue, yet they represent a very small share of GDP, well below the OECD average when considering only local governments (1.7% vs 4.5% in 2020). Overall, municipal income comes from various sources: the property tax, which is collected by the central government and distributed to municipalities; commercial patents; and vehicle taxes (vehicle licenses and transfers). Municipal governments have limited autonomy to set local tax rates, except for commercial patents. They also have regulatory limitations to charge fees for provision of public services, which are generally granted to the central government.

At the regional level, fiscal resources are transferred to the regional governments through the Budget Law of each year in their investment programs, and are constituted from various sources; among which are those of the National Fund for Regional Development (FNDR), the Innovation Fund for Competitiveness (FIC), transfers for capital expenditures from different sources such as mining, aquaculture or geothermal patents, the Regional Support Fund (FAR) for transportation, educational infrastructure, among others. However, none of these are reflected in the official public finance data as the regions do not yet have a separate financial existence from the central level.

TAX REVENUE: Although tax revenue represents a significant share of subnational government revenue in Chile, it is significantly lower than the OECD average both in terms of share of GDP and general government tax revenue (respectively 1.7% and 9.3% versus 7.2% and 32.3% in 2020). Only municipalities are allowed to receive tax revenue, but this situation could change with the new law on regional financing based on own-source revenues that will be designed in 2022. The most important tax is the property tax, followed by business licences paid on commercial activities undertaken in the municipal area, and the motor vehicle tax. Municipalities collect the business and vehicle tax, but the central government collects the property tax. The business tax is the only tax for which municipalities may vary the rate within a given range (from 2.5% to 5%).

The property tax, called the “territorial tax”, is applicable at a fixed rate of the fiscal value of rural and urban land and buildings. 40% of this territorial tax is municipal direct revenue while 60% of the territorial tax goes to the Municipal Common Fund (Fondo Común Municipal, FCM); these resources are then redistributed via the FCM, in the name of redistributive principles. The “territorial tax” is thus more like a national tax – allocated to municipalities based on a distribution mechanism using the territorial distribution of the net value (after exemptions) of property wealth – rather than a genuine, local own-source tax. Municipalities cannot set the rate and the territorial tax includes a long and extremely precise list of total or partial exonerations that are provided by the central government and which substantially erode its effectiveness. In 2022, 77% of all properties benefited from an exemption. In 2020, it represented 0.8% of GDP compared with 1% in the OECD on average.

GRANTS AND SUBSIDIES: In 1979, Chile implemented a large horizontal equalisation scheme, the Municipal Common Fund (Fondo Común Municipal, FCM). The FCM’s mission is unequivocal: decrease inter-municipal inequalities and provide additional resources to municipalities with the lowest tax revenues so they can fulfil their basic competences. The FCM’s resources come from automatic contributions from municipalities via the transfer of a portion of their tax revenues (i.e. territorial tax, municipal business licenses, vehicle registration tax, and the tax on vehicle transfer and revenues from fines). The vast majority of the FCM comes from the territorial tax (57% in 2018), followed by vehicles circulation permits (23%) and municipal patents (12%). In 2018, ten municipalities contributed almost half of the FCM and the remaining 314 contribute less than 1% each. Funds are distributed to beneficiaries according to a formula based on criteria such as the population, property exemptions, poverty and local revenue. This mechanism has become a crucial part of how municipal budgets are financed, and redistributes revenue among municipalities on a massive scale; revenues from the FCM accounted for 34% of total municipal revenues in 2018. The FCM has been reformed several times but it is still subject to criticism, due to its lack of transparency, complexity and its counterproductive and disincentive effects (fundamentally encouraging “fiscal laziness” and increasing dependency). In response to the October 2019 protests, the government has put forward a number of reforms to bring concrete and effective responses among which is the strengthening of the Municipal Common Fund to establish greater contributions from higher income regions.

Transfers to municipalities also include vertical transfers from the central government, composed mostly of earmarked transfers for health expenditure (delegated functions), and access to specific funds for social and investment programmes. In 2018, upon the approval of Law. 21.040, which created a new Public Education System, education transfers decreased.

OTHER REVENUE: Because of regulatory limitations, Chilean municipalities rarely charge, directly or indirectly, for public services. When they do, contributions from users tend to be modest. Municipal tariffs and fees account for 2.6% of subnational revenue, well below the OECD average of 13%. Very few municipalities receive revenues from concessions since concession holders frequently operate in their territory but have a contract with the central government (e.g. ports, roads, mining, etc.). Likewise, revenues derived from property income are limited. The top ten municipalities account for more than half of revenue generated from their properties.

ⓘ No detailed data available for this country

FISCAL RULES: The Constitutional Organic Law (LOCMUN) for municipalities states that municipal councils should not approve unbalanced budgets. However, the rule does not explicitly refer to the need of having a balanced budget at the end of the budget year (on an accrual basis). OECD recommendations to the Chilean government in this regard include the need to enhance the current budget balance rule, including clear-cut escape clauses in the case of exceptional circumstances, as well as an alert system to monitor unpaid balances and detect municipalities at high risk of non-compliance.

DEBT: Subnational government borrowing is prohibited in Chile for both current and capital financing. Municipalities are not allowed to borrow funds according to the Constitution and the LOCMUN. Chile is the only OECD country where this is the case. However, in practice, a few municipalities are allowed to generate debt within limits, and others must apply to Congress for the ability to do so. Besides, subnational governments hold a non-financial debt through their debt to suppliers (commercial debt), arrears and leasing contracts, or temporary pension debts. Monitoring of municipal arrears in Chile has improved; yet, according to SUBDERE, this floating debt accounts for around 1% of municipal revenues, and is concentrated in 80 municipalities.

TERRITORIAL MANAGEMENT OF THE CRISIS: In the early stage of the COVID-19 pandemic in Chile, the central government developed a preparedness and response plan. Preventive measures focused on strengthening the epidemiology surveillance network and developing diagnosis capacity. The sanitary alert status, put in place in February 2020, granted extraordinary competences to the main health institution in the country, including the 16 regional services of the Health Ministry (Seremis Salud) and the 29 health services (Servicios de Salud) in three main lines of action: (1) strengthening the public health network; (2) surveillance of patients with acute respiratory failure; and (3) epidemiological research.

The government also established the Social Committee for COVID-19 (Mesa social por COVID-19) formed by representatives of municipal associations (mayors), government authorities, academics and professionals from the health sector. The Committee met twice a week to help strengthen the Action Plan for COVID-19. This committee was replicated at the regional level. One of the key outputs of the national committee was the creation of the COVID-19 Database based on information from the Ministry of Health. Data at the national, regional and local levels on daily deaths and contagions, critical patients, recoveries, among others, was made publicly available.

At the local level, mayors of several municipalities, quickly reacted through organisations such as the Association of Municipalities of Chile (AMUCH). Mayors organised to lead immediate response strategies to the needs of the populations in their territories. Even without having the necessary powers to deploy health strategies or make discretionary use of emergency budgets, the rapid and effective responses of municipalities revealed the importance of subnational administrations in managing part of the responsibilities of the public administration. In this context, groups of mayors repeatedly warned about the territorial inequalities that the COVID-19 crisis was revealing throughout the national territory, and, as a result of this debate, many articles were published in the press demanding greater autonomy for municipalities. This has become a hot topic in the context of the constituent process that Chile is going through.

EMERGENCY MEASURES TO COPE WITH THE CRISIS AT THE DIFFERENT LEVELS OF GOVERNMENT: The government provided for the transfer of more than USD 220 million from the Solidarity Fund (Fondo Solidario) to 342 out of 345 municipalities in the country with the purpose of addressing the COVID crisis and counteracting the decrease in the income of subnational governments. A first instalment of USD 100 million was announced in May 2020, and a second of USD 120 million in July 2020.The amounts transferred were established taking into consideration the population of each municipality and their level of vulnerability. Whereas the funds were previously earmarked for extra expenditures related to the pandemic, such as the purchase of medicine, the second instalment was flexible, enabling municipalities to use the funds to cover their operating expenditures in general, to be spent until 2022. The 2021 Budget Law also provided for a liquidity advance to the municipalities that have seen their own income diminished during the pandemic, and more flexible terms of reimbursement (postponed to 2022). In November 2020, the mayors of the three national associations of municipalities signed a Protocol of Agreement with the Government, to formalise the financial support related the COVID-19 crisis.

IMPACTS OF THE CRISIS ON SUBNATIONAL GOVERNMENT FINANCE: To manage the COVID-19, the government put in place “dynamic lockdowns” by municipal perimeters that totally or partially prohibited commercial and industrial activity and freedom of movement. These dynamic lockdowns were defined weekly according to the health situation of the different municipalities. By restricting economic activity, many businesses had to close, negatively affecting the collection of commercial licenses, one of the main sources of municipal income. At the same time, the social consequences of the health crisis put pressure on municipal income, generating a greater demand for emergency social aid. There is some evidence showing that the quarantine measures decided at the central level had heterogeneous impact across the territories at the short and medium term. The two main impacts at the local level were: (i) quarantine had a higher economic impact on metropolitan and highly developed municipalities; and (ii) municipalities with a higher proportion of the population below the poverty line experienced greater negative economic growth.

ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL STIMULUS PLANS: The central government implemented the “Step by step, Chile Recovers” (“Paso a Paso, Chile se recupera”) recovery plan, which, in addition to employment incentives and investment support, has an important focus on SMEs. The Public Investment chapter of the “Paso a Paso” plan considered an additional amount of USD 4 500 million over the regular budget of the Ministries for public investment between 2020 and 2022. Among other things, the portfolio of projects financed prioritise direct support to municipalities and enhanced mobility and integration of cities. Resources for the development of local investment initiatives amounted to USD 125 million. These resources were channelled through the Neighbourhood Improvement Program, focused on providing minimal sanitary conditions (sewerage, drinking water and electrification); and through the Urban Improvement Program, focused on minor infrastructure such as squares, parks, fields and bicycle lanes.