The Aquino administration needs a national budget of P2 trillion for 2013 to build 65,000 classrooms and more national roads, a Cabinet official said Tuesday, noting the President will have to approved the amount before it can be submitted to Congress for deliberations.
In an interview with reporters before the Vin d’Honneur in Malacañang, Abad said there is no final figure yet, but “it will hover about that number.”
The proposed budget will be finalized this week before it is presented to Aquino and the Cabinet, the Budget secretary noted.
“We are still reviewing the proposals from the different agencies, but we hope to finish that this week, and we will cap the week with a discussion of the DBCC (Development Budget Coordinating Council) where we hope to finalize the macroeconomic assumptions which will provide us or guide us in determining the ceiling for the budget,” he said.
This year’s budget is P1.816 trillion or 10.4 percent more than the P1.645 trillion in 2011. Abad said the plan is to propose–to the President–a higher level of infrastructure spending to meet the administration’s commitments on finishing the construction of arterial national roads by end of 2014.
Next year’s budget would help close the classroom gap of 65,000 and achieve rice self-sufficiency by end of 2013, “which would mean continuing the vigorous spending on agricultural infrastructure.”
Plus, the government intends to increase by 500,000 families the beneficiaries of the Conditional Cash Transfer (CCT) program “which may bring up the budget further beyond P40 billion,” according to the Budget chief.
This year’s CCT budget is P39 billion. Also, the passage of the sin tax bill and the rationalization of fiscal incentives will provide P40 billion to P50 billion in additional revenues “that may leave us further physical space to make investments,” Abad said.
He noted the money could also be used to boost tourism infrastructure. “We have to build more roads that lead to identifying tourism zones as well as arterial farm to market roads that lead to production zones.”
More personnel in tourism-related offices like the Bureau of Immigration, Customs, and Quarantine as well as airline offices are need, he said.
“Particularly since we are going to maximize the utilization of certain airports… for example, lighting it up so we can have night operations and therefore decongest NAIA (Ninoy Aquino International Airport),” Abad added.
Source: GMA News