Spending review represents a set of organizational and analytical activities aimed to supporting the establishment of an efficient system of public expenditures and identifying potential sectors/areas where non-priority or inefficient expenditures are produced.

Spending review aims to create a fiscal space that responds to new priorities or emerging budget pressures, redirecting low-priority, inefficient or ineffective expenditures, following an in-depth analysis of them. This ensures higher quality as well as more sustainable budget adjustments than ad hoc spending cuts or horizontal cuts.  

Spending review, which systematically examines expenditure, can contribute to the achievement of the Government's macro-fiscal objectives by identifying a set of optimization measures with increased efficiency:

1) reduction of global expenses to help achieve the Government’s medium-term budgetary-fiscal consolidation objectives;

2) creating a fiscal space that responds to new priorities or emerging budgetary pressures;

3) re-prioritization of expenses from low-priority areas to high-priority ones both within and between branch ministries; and

4) improving the value for money by identifying areas of inefficient spending, where similar results can be achieved with reduced resources.