Budget deficit in 2010 could end up lower than the P325 billion ceiling owing to good collections, a Department of Finance (DOF) official said Thursday.
“Full year deficit was more than P5 billion lower than target,†Finance Undersecretary Gil Beltran told reporters.
Beltran expressed this optimism following the release of the November data indicating that the government incurred a budget surplus of P482 million, a reversal from the P6.4 billion deficit in November 2009.
This brought down the January to November to P269.8 billion compared to year-ago's 11-month deficit of P272.5 billion.
Revenues amounted to P1.10 trillion, 8.1 percent higher than the P1.02 trillion in 2009. Revenue program for this year is P1.29 trillion.
The Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) collected P753.3 billion, 10.5 percent up from 2009’s P681.9 billion.
While revenues of the Bureau of Customs (BOC) reached P233.5 billion, 15.9 percent higher than its P201.4 billion it had in end-November last year.
Collection by the Bureau of the Treasury (BTr) totaled to P52.4 billion, 13.4 percent lower than its P60.5 billion in end-November 2009 and the Other Offices collected P93.2 billion, lower by 15.8 percent than P77.8 billion in 2009.
Expenses as of end-November this year totaled to P1.37 trillion, 6.2 percent up from P1.29 trillion the previous year. Expenditure program for the whole of 2010 is P1.58 trillion.
Economic managers have earlier hinted a below-than-ceiling budget gap this year on account of prudent spending in the second semester.
This, after the previous administration front-loaded expenditures in the first six months of 2010 to ensure continued growth of the domestic economy. - pna
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