Govt bringing budget mgmt and fiscal accountability law

KATHMANDU, March 19: In a bid to bring fiscal budget in time and improve budget implementation, the government has announced to formulate budget management and fiscal accountability law.

Unveiling the government´s common minimum program here on Tuesday, Minister for Information and Communications Minendra Rijal said the government would fix a new schedule for budget announcement so that there is ample time to implement budget and fiscal programs.

The coalition government led by Nepali Congress (NC) has also said the new law would repel political influence in budget formulation and implementation process.
Baikuntha Aryal, joint secretary at the Ministry of Finance (MoF), said the new law would make timely introduction of budget and implementation of budgetary programs legally binding. Aryal said officials of the finance ministry were busy drafting the law.

Experts have welcomed the government´s move. They said it would end uncertainty over budgetary programs. Economist Bishwambher Pyakuryal said the government should endorse the proposed law from parliament at the earliest. “We have seen only a few full-fledged budgets after 1990s,” he said, adding that the trend of issuing partial budget has affected the national economy badly.

Though the government introduced full budget for this fiscal year, there has been low progress in capital expenditure. Only 23 percent of budget set aside for development works have been invested so far.

“The trend of spending in the eleventh hour affects quality of work and erodes capital formation,” he added.

Aryal said preparations were on to present budget for the coming fiscal year in mid-June to provide sufficient time for discussions and approval of budget and programs before the fiscal year begins in mid-July.

Likewise, the government has also announced to institute a separate ´infrastructure development fund´ in which the unspent budget of big priority projects of road, irrigation and hydropower would be diverted at the end of fiscal year. The government will release additional budget for big projects from the fund.

Pyakuryal, however, said budget would not be a problem for big projects. “The government should make timely amendment to the laws related to land acquisition and procurement as well as harmonize various contradictory laws that have affected development projects,” he added.

The government has also vowed to bring a number of laws, including amendment to Industrial Enterprise Act, Special Economic Zone Act, among others, for industrial development and investment promotion.

Source: REPUBLICA