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Monday, April 16, 2012

2012 budget to generate N9.7 trn growth revenue – Okonjo-Iweala

Dr Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Coordinating Minister for the Economy, on Monday in Abuja said the growth collectible revenue estimated in 2012 budget was N9.692 trillion.
Okonjo-Iweala, who gave the figure at the 2012 budget presentation organised by the Budget office of the Federation, said that the figure was based on 2.48 million barrels oil production per day.
President GoodLuck Jonathan, on Friday signed 2012 budget of N4.697 trillion.
“The 2012 budget has growth severally collectible revenues estimated at N9.692 trillion based on bench mark oil production of 2.48 million barrel per day and benchmark oil price of 72 dollars per barrel.
The benchmark oil price of 72 dollars per barrel per day was an increase from the original 70 dollars per barrel proposed by the Federal Government.
“This increase of two dollar per barrel by the National Assembly yielded an addition N98.4 billion.
“Out of which N50 billion was used to reduce the deficit and therefore domestic borrowing requirement while the balance was used to increase capital spending.
“Consequently, the total forecast revenue for the federal budget is N3.5 trillion with an oil component of 1.9 trillion and non-oil component of 1.6 trillion,’’
She said that the total expenditure approved in the 2012 budget was comprised of the regular budgetary appropriation of N4.69 trillion.
Okonjo-Iweala said that an appropriation of N180 billion was made for the implementation of programmes and projects under the Subsidy Re-investment and Empowerment programme (SURE).
She said that the Personnel cost on the budget was N1.565 trillion, which represented 75 per cent of aggregate expenditure.
“This represents the several wage increases granted in recent times which leads to 93 per cent increase between 2009 and 2012.
“The rising wage bill is disturbing because it undermines our ability to invest in capital projects and when we talk about consolidation over the medium term, this is one of the areas we look at.
“We have statutory transfer of N372.6 billion, capital expenditure of N1.33 trillion, its shared at the percentage of aggregate expenditure increase from 25.6 per cent in 2011 to 28.5 per cent in 2012,’’
She noted that the share of the recurrent had decreased to 71.5 per cent from 74.7 per cent in 2011, adding that the drive to correct structural imbalances in the budget would continue in 2013 budget.
Okonjo-Iweala said that over the medium term, the recurrent had been brought down to about 65 per cent of the budget while increasing the capital expenditure.
“Based on the above, the deficit is N1.13 trillion or 2.85 per cent of GDP, which is within the three per cent of GDP threshold set by the Fiscal Responsibility Act.
“The provision for domestic borrowing had come down to 7.44 billion when compared to N852 billion in the 2011 budget. This is a big achievement.
“It underscores the necessity to control the rising domestic debt profile which has been of big concern,’’
She said that N559.6 billion would be used to service domestic and foreign debt, adding that the external debt profile was 5.9 billion dollars, while domestic debt was N5.96 trillion.
“In naira terms both domestic and external debt stands at 6.8 trillion or dollar terms at 44 billion dollars,’’
She noted that the debt profile was still below the 30 per cent ratio that was set as the range for monitoring debt profile performance in the country, but said that the domestic debt must be monitored.
She said that Nigeria economy remained robust and when properly managed would yield growth rate that would place the economy high as expected.
She urged Nigerians, Civil Society Organisations to help in the monitoring of the 2012 budget implementation as it would help government to achieve its goals. (NAN)

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