KATHMANDU, FEBRUARY 1

Finance Minister Janardan Sharma has directed the secretaries of all the ministries to submit the details of the projects and plans under their ministries, clarifying whether or not expenditure is possible.

Addressing a review meeting on capital expenditure so far in the current fiscal year, he said that if the concerned authorities fulfilled their respective obligations, there would be no need to hold such meetings.

'Putting pressure on the secretaries to ramp up capital expenditure time and again is not a good thing, and the culture of constantly needing to push for acceleration of development works before any real progress is made has to come to an end,' he said.

The finance minister also urged the secretaries to give their suggestions along with experiences after half-yearly review of the expenditures.

Finance Minister Sharma stressed on the need for the ministries with better capital expenditure to take the initiatives for taking the projects forward. The Ministry of Agriculture should play a greater role in this, he asserted.

The finance minister's instructions have come at a time when the country's capital expenditure has continued to be sluggish - at less than 15 per cent of the allocated budget till today.

The recurrent expenditure stood at 41.53 per cent, while financing spending till today was 27.72, according to the Financial Comptroller General Office (FCGO).

The total expenditure of the government so far in this fiscal year was recorded at 33.78 per cent.

Meanwhile, the total receipts of the government was 50.16 per cent. This included 48.41 per cent of the target revenue collection (48.87 per cent tax revenue and 44.04 per cent non-tax revenue) and 23.17 per cent of grants.

A version of this article appears in the print on February 2, 2022, of The Himalayan Times.