Revised ADP size likely to be 3.2pc less than original
The National Economic Council (NEC) is set to approve the Revised Annual Development Programme (RADP) for the 2017-18 fiscal year on Tuesday with a proposal for making a 3.23 per cent cut from the original ADP size.
“The NEC meeting will be held tomorrow [Tuesday] and it will be proposed before the meeting to make a Tk 49.50 billion cut from the original ADP of Tk 1533.31 billion,” a senior planning commission official told BSS on Monday.
Prime minister Sheikh Hasina will preside over the meeting at the NEC conference room in the city’s Sher-e-Bangla Nagar area.
The NEC earlier approved a Tk 1533.31 billion ADP for the current fiscal year with Tk 963.31 billion coming from the domestic resources while Tk 570 billion from the foreign resources, said the official.
Considering Tk 49.50 billion cut from the foreign resources portion, the revised ADP size would be proposed at Tk 1483.81 billion, said the planning commission official.
Apart from this, the portion from the organisation’s own fund in the RADP is also likely to see a Tk 15.40 billion cut to Tk 92.13 billion.
Another official at the planning ministry said the ministry is likely to request prime minister Sheikh Hasina to increase the government’s fund and keep the ADP size unchanged.
The same thing happened in the last year’s revised ADP as the budget size remained intact but the government’s own fund component was raised by the same amount in that NEC meeting with a slash in foreign aid.
State minister for finance and planning MA Mannan said it is a usual practice in the country to witness slight cut in the ADP during formulation of the RADP.
The final decision however would ultimately be taken in the NEC meeting with the prime minister in the chair.
The prime minister could keep intact the overall size if there is any request and finally the ultimate adjustment of allocations would be made against the different sectors and ministries after some days of the NEC meeting.
He, however, expressed his high hope that the executing agencies would be able to attain almost cent per cent implementation rate this year. “There is no doubt that the capacity of the government has increased manifold and the base of our confidence is strong,” Mannan said.
According to the planning commission sources, the transport sector will continue to enjoy the highest priority in the revised ADP followed by power sector, rural development and rural institution sector, physical planning, water supply and housing, education and religious sector, science, information and communication technology, health, nutrition, population and family planning, and agriculture sector.
The data from the Implementation Monitoring and Evaluation Division (IMED) showed that the ADP implementation rate during the July-February period of the current fiscal year reached 38.01 per cent with an overall expenditure of Tk 623.70 billion.
Of the overall expenditure, Tk 336.54 billion were spent from the public exchequer which was 34.94 per cent of the overall government allocation, Tk 253.39 billion were spent from the project assistances which was 41.94 per cent of the overall project assistance allocation while the rest of Tk 33.77 billion were spent from the organisations’ own funds which was 46.03 per cent of its allocation.
The ADP for the current fiscal year features a total of 1,308 projects including 1,077 investment projects, 111 technical assistant projects, four projects from the Japan Debt Cancellation Fund (JDCF) while another 116 projects from the organisation’s own fund.
Besides, a list of 360 unapproved projects without having any allocation subject to the availability of foreign funds is also included in the original ADP of the current year.