Diokno: PH reverses 12 years of underspending
Credit to Author: CATHERINE S. VALENTE, TMT| Date: Wed, 06 Mar 2019 05:37:04 +0000
OUTGOING Budget Secretary Benjamin Diokno on Wednesday announced that 98.5 percent of the P3.767-trillion national budget for 2018 has been released, reversing 12 years of underspending in government.
Diokno, who was recently appointed Banko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) governor, said actual disbursements in 2018 totaled P3.4 trillion, higher than the programmed P3.37 trillion.
“I am glad to report that underspending is a thing of the past, in fact we are slightly overspending,” Diokno told reporters during a press briefing.
“This reverses 12 straight years of underspending where actual disbursements of the national government fell short of the program,” he said.
Diokno said last year’s disbursements were driven by spending on public infrastructure and personnel services.
“One of the drivers of government spending of fiscal year 2018 is higher spending on public infrastructure and personnel services,” he said.
“This accounted for more than half of total disbursements,” Diokno said.
Diokno said infrastructure spending reached P886.2 billion, which is higher than the target of P868.6 billion.
“This was equivalent to 5.1 percent of the GDP (gross domestic product),” he said.
Diokno said previously that infrastructure spending in the first two years of the current administration was better than in the past governments.
The Duterte administration took office in July 2016, thus, its first full-year in office started in 2017.
Infrastructure spending in 2017 accounted for 6.3 percent of GDP and 6.2 percent in 2018, according to the Department of Budget and Management (DBM).
The DBM said latest annual infrastructure spending was way higher than the 2 percent average since 1986.
“This is in line with the Duterte administration’s target of increasing infrastructure spending to more than 7.0 percent of GDP by 2022,” it said.
Under the Ramos administration, infrastructure spending in 1993 was about 1.3 percent of GDP, while it was 1.9 percent of total domestic output the following year.
Under the administration of former president Joseph Estrada, it was 1.4 percent of GDP in 1998 and 1.7 percent in 1999; under Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, 1.7 percent in 2001 and 1.4 percent in 2002; and under the second Aquino administration, 1.8 percent in 2011 and 2 percent in 2012.
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