CA advises preparing ‘realistic’ budget

Government high-ups have instructed finance officials to focus improvement in people's living standard and wellbeing in budgeting in a pivot from making growth-centric budget of the past times, sources said.

The advice came when finance division officials Saturday placed the next budget outline before Chief Adviser Dr Muhammad Yunus seeking his opinion.

A senior official attending the meeting told the Financial Express that the head of interim government "didn't ask us to bring any major arithmetical changes in the proposed budgetary allocations".

Rather, he asked them to prepare a "realistic" and "implementable" budget instead of allocating money for unnecessary spending.

The Chief Adviser, according to the official, particularly gave importance on taking measures for employment generation for the youths and ensuring women rights.

He also asked for taking steps to alleviate inflationary pressures as people have been suffering from high commodity prices for long.

The Chief Adviser, sources said, also asked the officials for improvement in investment climate in the country.

He also advocated for giving thrust on health and education sectors in the next fiscal budget, the official said.

For the next fiscal year, the government has decided to prepare a Tk 7.90-trillion contractionary budget, slightly smaller from the current outlay of Tk 7.97 trillion.

This is for the first time in the country's history the government is preparing a fiscal budget smaller than the previous one, taking into consideration the financing trend, according to officials concerned.

Some Tk 5.18 trillion has been targeted as revenue earnings in the next fiscal year while the Annual Development Programme (ADP) spending has been set at Tk 2.30 trillion.

The gross domestic product (GDP) growth has been targeted 5.5 per cent for the next fiscal year while the budget officials have set a target to bring down the rate of inflation to 6.5 per cent.

Also, they have decided to keep budget deficit at 3.62 per cent or Tk 2.26 trillion and the size of GDP in current prices for next fiscal year has been estimated at Tk 62.5 trillion.

syful-islam@outlook.com