By Our Reporter
The national economy which has shown signs of a slight improvement in mid-January has again headed in a negative direction.
According to the latest statistics of the Financial Comptroller General Office (FCGO), the gap between the government income and expenditure widened further in a month when the improvements noticed in mid-January could not sustain in February.
The revenue mobilisation has remained poor and income was not enough to meet public expenditure despite the utilisation of less than one-fifth of the allocated capital budget.
The gap between government income and expenditure has been negative by Rs. 120 billion. The gap was Rs. 87.6 billion in the third week of January with total government receipts being Rs. 501.3 billion and expenditure Rs. 588.9 billion, according to the FCGO – an agency under the Ministry of Finance (MoF) which is responsible for the treasury operation of the government.
The government has received Rs. 568.8 billion in tax and non-tax revenue and grants by Monday while total expenditure from the treasury is Rs. 688.6 billion, the statistics show.
Even seven months into the current Fiscal Year 2022/23, only 37.71 per cent of total annual revenue and grant estimates of Rs. 1458.6 billion is met. This includes Rs. 529.1 billion (37.71 per cent of the yearly target) of revenue and Rs. 4.8 billion grant (8.66 per cent of the target).
Meanwhile, mobilisation of the capital budget has also remained poor following the trend of the previous many years with just 18.44 per cent utilisation of Rs. 380.3 allocations. Recurrent expenditure, which is used to finance everyday work of the government including the salary of the employees and maintenance of facilities, stands at 46.36 per cent (Rs. 548.5 billion) of the allocation of Rs. 1183.2 billion.
Last year, the government raised Rs. 628.8 billion in revenue during the same period which was 53.27 per cent of the total estimates. But the expenditure was only 37.69 per cent – Rs. 615.4 billion. The size of the budget in the last fiscal 2021/22 was Rs. 1632.8 billion.
It seems that the sluggish mobilisation of the capital budget has given some relief to the government. If the development allocation had been fully utilised, the government would have been under greater pressure to manage the fund to finance it. A recent temporary ban on the crusher industry across the country, and a significant price rise in construction materials like cement, and iron bars due to the Russia-Ukraine war have slowed down the development works.
Amidst the poor budget performance, the government has adjusted the budget and lowered the annual target of income and expenditure. During the mid-term review of the budget for the current FY 2022/23, the government lowered the budget by 14 per cent to Rs. 1549.99 billion.
The recurrent budget is brought down to Rs. 1021.9 billion (86.37 per cent) from earlier Rs. 1183.2 billion and the capital allocation of Rs. 380.3 billion is revised to be Rs.313.8 billion which is 82.51 per cent of the earlier allocation.
Login to add a comment