Within the framework of the EUROsociAL II Programme, financed by the European Union, a technical assistance mission to Uruguay's Directorate of Budgets, Control and Evaluation of Management of the Office of Planning and Budget (AGEV-OPP) was held in Montevideo, Uruguay from 19th to 23rd October 2015 to support an analysis of the efficiency of public interventions.

The purpose of the activity was to lend technical and practical support to the AGEV-OPP for conducting an efficiency analysis of public interventions which made it possible to identify the production limits of different units that deliver services and, based on these, to analyse whether or not these are close to the results that are possible.  

To do so, a team from the AGEV was trained on how to use a methodology and specific software, training which will enable the parties responsible for assessment in Uruguay to define the situations in which public interventions may be subject to efficiency assessment. Subsequently, a series of public interventions that may be subject to assessment were selected and, lastly, two public services in particular were assessed: hospitalisation care in the country and training centres. 

In the first case, the assessment included a total of 34 hospitals selected based on the uniformity of the services provided, all of which provide hospitalisation services (not ambulatory) and are located throughout the country.

In the second case, non-formal training centres were assessed, in particular those known as Training and Production Education Centres (CECAPs in their Spanish acronym). 

The activity included the participation of Uruguay's Directorate of Budget, Control and Assessment. The EUROsociAL Programme provided advising by two Spanish experts, one from the Department of Economy and Public Finance of the Autonomous University of Madrid, and the other from the Institute for Tax Studies.

This activity is part of the Budget-Plan Link action of the EUROsociAL Programme, coordinated by the FIIAPP with Spain's Institute for Tax Studies (IEF) and Uruguay's Office of Planning and Budget acting as operational partners.