Budget Secretary Amenah F. Pangandaman on Monday urged government agencies to further ramp up the disbursement of funds and spend more so as to optimize its impact on the broad economy.
Government spending counts as a major contributor to this year’s target growth ranging from 6 percent to seven percent in terms of the gross domestic product (GDP).
This developed as the Department of Budget and Management noted the various government agencies have posted a utilization rate of 90 percent from January to April this year.
This is reflected on the report on utilization of so-called notices of cash allocations or NCAs for national government agencies and budgetary support to government-owned or -controlled corporations (GOCCs) and local government units (LGUs) as of end April 2023, published on the DBM website.
The 90-percent utilization rate is equivalent to P1.175 trillion of NCAs utilized for the period.
NCAs are cash authority documents issued by the DBM to the account of agencies/operating units through the authorized government servicing banks to cover the cash requirements of the agencies for their programs and projects.
“We all know that our national budget is the lifeblood of all government programs and projects. The faster we disburse and utilize our funds, the faster we can procure and implement our projects.”
Budget Secretary Amenah F. Pangandaman
“That’s why we want to remind our agencies to avoid underspending, given our very limited fiscal space. Again, we need to instill discipline in our national government agencies or we shall put the money to agencies which can really implement them. We have to remember, as early as the start of the year, we have emphasized that only implementation-ready proposals will be included in the 2024 Budget,” she added.
As of 30 April 2023, the DBM has released P2.982 trillion or 94.8 percent of total agency specific budget to various national government agencies. In sum, the DBM has released P4.518 trillion or 85.8 percent of the P5.268 trillion national budget as of 30 April 2023.
