Nov 09, 2016 (LBO) - Sri Lanka's Minister of Finance said that the 2017 Budget will be a pro-growth budget which will focus on the deficiencies for the last several years.
"Accordingly the budget would have proposals to rectify all the anomalies that are there to deal with export sector to create job," Ravi Karunanayake, minister of Finance said.
“It will be a real over view and over look of all the sectors of the economy that is beneficial to the people in the short run and long run.”
The minister said that the economy inherited was not easy for any Finance Minister to manage due to over 9.9 trillion rupee public debt besides 1.2 trillion rupees debt off the balance sheet.
"However, with strict financial discipline, the government was able to pay attention on the financial consolidation and reducing the budget deficit."
Karunanayake said that the government targets a fiscal deficit of 3.5 percent of GDP by 2020 where it has planned to reduce it to 4.7 percent next year from a targeted 5.4 percent in 2016.
The value of the GDP has increased to 11,183 billion rupees (US$ 82.
3 B) in 2015 from 6,414 billion rupees (US$ 56.7B) in 2010.
The next year’s budget will allocate around 380 billion rupees on welfare and subsidies.
Once the Budget is presented in the Parliament on Thursday the debate on the second reading and the committee stage will continue till 10 December 2016.
