Moldovan cabinet approves draft state budget law for 2016

Chisinau, 18 May /MOLDPRES/ - The cabinet of ministers today approved the draft state budget law for 2016 in revenues with 31.37 billion lei and in spending amounting to 35.56 billion lei, with a deficit worth 4.18 billion lei.

The state budget for 2016 was built on a slight 1.5-per cent economic growth, an inflation rate of 10.5 per cent and an exchange rate of 21.1 lei for one U.S. dollar. For 2016, the average monthly salary for a wage earner on the economy is planned to reach 5,050 lei, up by 9.5 per cent in nominal values against 2015.  

The state budget revenues are scheduled to rise by 11.1 per cent against the budget carried out in 2015. “The increase in the state budget revenues, in fact, is explained by a significant growth in the structure of the budget’s incomes and grants for budgetary support – entries from which did not occur in 2015,” according to the Finance Ministry. The state budget spending will increase by 17.1 per cent against 2015. The budget deficit will be covered preponderantly from external sources (3.7 billion lei), said participants in the government meeting.  

Finance Minister Octavian Armasu has explained the delay in the working out of the draft by the fact that “the budget sees a component of external financing in form of grants and in form of loans, and before approving the draft budget, we wanted at least some certainty that we will have this financing.”  

Under draft state budget, the fund for subsidizing agricultural producers will be of 900 million lei, of which 387.6 million lei from the budget support programme ENPARD of the European Commission. Money is provided for in the budget including for increasing the wages of teachers by ten per cent starting from 1 September 2016, gradual increase of the salaries of judges, as well as other adjustings.    

The state debt balance will stand at 56.1 billion lei on 31 December 2016, up by 22.6 billion against 31 December 2015. Under the draft budget law, in late 2016, the domestic state debt will not exceed 21 billion lei.  

The Finance Ministry stressed that the draft budget for 2016 “is based on the conclusion of a programme on cooperation with IMF, which is of major importance for ensuring sustainability of the budget, both on short term and medium term. The lack of such a programme might jeopardize the getting of an external budgetary support, the sum of which is of 4,679.5 million lei in the draft state budget,” of which 2.59 billion lei represent non-refundable financing.

At the same time, the ministry said that, if the public authorities failed to carry out the measures of policies provided for in the matrixes of policies for each programme of external budgetary support separately, the concerned support will be cut.

The draft state budget law is to be submitted to parliament for consideration and adoption.  

(Reporter V. Bercu, editor L. Alcaza)