The national government’s budget deficit in 2021 widened from the previous year’s level amid continued pandemic-related spending, among others.
However, it remains within the deficit ceiling for the year.
The Bureau of the Treasury (BTr) yesterday reported in a statement the government’s full-year budget deficit for 2021 reached P1.67 trillion, 21.78 percent higher versus the previous year’s P1.38 trillion as the double-digit hike in expenditures outpaced the increase in revenues.
The deficit is equivalent to 8.61 percent of gross domestic product, which the BTr said is lower than the 9.3 percent program but still higher compared to the 7.65 percent recorded in the previous year.
The deficit is still 10 percent within the P1.86 trillion program for the year.
Full-year disbursements reached P4.68 trillion, growing by 10.6 percent from the previous year’s level of P4.23 trillion, which the BTr said is due to infrastructure and other capital expenditures, continued spending for various recovery measures including vaccine procurement and equity infusion in support of government financial institution lending assistance programs, as well as higher internal revenue allotment shares of local government units.
However, compared to the full-year program of P4.74 trillion, year-to-date expenditures were still lower by 1.3 percent, which the BTr said was mainly due to lower-than-programmed interest payments.
The full-year revenue of P3.01 trillion improved by 5.24 percent over last year’s P2.86 trillion, and was 4.3 percent better than the P2.88 trillion program.
The Bureau of Internal Revenue collected P2.08 trillion for the year, 6.51 percent better versus last year’s performance of P1.95 trillion, but was 0.15 percent short of the P2.08 trillion full-year program.
The Bureau of Customs’ full-year collection reached P643.6 billion, outperforming last year’s revenues of P537.7 billion and the target of P616.7 billion by 19.69 percent and 4.35 percent, respectively.
According to the BTr, the revenue effort for 2021 declined to 15.5 percent from 15.92 percent last year but exceeded the program of 14.52 percent.
Tax effort of 14.13 percent, on the other hand, was up from last year’s 13.96 percent and the program of 13.68 percent.
Total expenditure was 24.12 percent of GDP, higher than the 23.57 percent registered in 2020 and the target of 23.87 percent. – Angela Celis
