October 28, 2026
Beirut – Economy Portal
Finance Minister Yassine Jaber stressed that the goal of technical cooperation with French partners is not limited to bringing in experts, but rather to benefit from French experience to build permanent local capabilities within the ministry, especially in the macro-fiscal policy unit and the cash management unit, through practical training and the transfer of knowledge in a sustainable manner.
Jaber, during his meeting with the Regional Director of the French Agency for Technical Expertise (Expertise France), Edouard Meunier, and the lawyer Michel Khadij, in the presence of the Director General of Finance, Georges Maarawi, and the Minister’s Advisor, Claudine Karaki, stressed the depth of the Lebanese-French relations and France’s continued support for Lebanon financially, politically, and diplomatically, stressing the importance of this cooperation to support the path of financial reform and enhance transparency.
Following the first meeting of the Steering Committee of the FEXTE “Transparency in Budget” project – financed by the French Development Agency (AFD) and implemented by Expertise France – the French team pledged to convey the Ministry’s request to coordinate additional training programs and exchange visits for the Ministry’s staff to France to learn about best practices. The meeting also discussed the agency’s legal status in Lebanon and tax exemptions for its projects.
In the same context, Director General of Finance George Maaraoui chaired the first meeting of the Steering Committee (Comité de pilotage) for the project, with the participation of the Deputy Head of the Regional Economic Department at the French Embassy, Vincent Deidre, and the Deputy Director of the French Development Agency, Marie Nona. The attendees stressed that enhancing budget transparency is a strategic priority to meet the requirements of the International Monetary Fund.
The committee reviewed the annual outcome of the project’s activities, most notably the institutionalization of the production of public finance statistics, and the presentation by experts Nicolas Bouton and Wassim Bakari of a proposal for a transitional technical solution for data collection and governance pending the completion of the Integrated Financial Information Management System (IFMIS). The outcome included processing about 200,000 non-electronic payment receipts accumulated since 2025, and unifying the data of public institutions outside the budget to include financial risks.
The committee decided to expand the scope of monitoring budget implementation to include expenditures and revenues, and link them to the medium-term financial framework (between November 2026 and August 2027), in addition to integrating sectoral analysis to avoid interference with the SIGMA program.
For her part, Treasury Director Rana Karam proposed modernizing the electronic collection of revenues, adopting a mechanism for reconciling transactions and bank statements, and strengthening internal control in preparation for adopting the International Public Sector Accounting Standards (IPSAS). In turn, Director of Public Accounting, Abdul Hafeez Supra, proposed accelerating the closing of accounts, completing the annual closing of the account, and settling advances granted to institutions.
At the conclusion of the meeting, the two sides agreed to hold a technical meeting before the end of the year to resolve the option of a technical solution, its cost, and timetable.
