The government missed its revenue and spending targets last year, resulting in a full-year budget deficit of P353.4 billion.
Bureau of the Treasury data released showed that the government’s deficit was 9 percent lower than the revised program of P388.9 billion, although almost three times bigger than the deficit of P121.7 billion in 2015.
The end-2016 budget deficit was equivalent to 2.4 percent of the gross domestic product (GDP), slightly below the programmed 2.7 percent.
For the medium term, the Duterte administration had programmed wider yearly deficits equal to 3 percent of GDP as it wanted to spend more on hard infrastructure.
In 2016, the government’s expenditures on public goods and services totaled P2.549 trillion, up 14 percent from 2015’s P2.231 trillion. But state spending last year was 4 percent below the P2.646-trillion goal.
Total interest payments in 2016 reached P304.5 billion, hence generating P23.3 billion in savings as the actual amount was lower than the P327.7-billion programmed.
“The share of interest payments out of total revenue decreased to 13.9 percent from 14.7 percent in the previous year, indicating improved capacity of the national government to service its debt. Interest payments comprised 11.9 percent of total expenditures, lower than the 13.9 percent recorded in 2015, an indication of a wider fiscal space for productive government spending,” the Treasury said.
“Net of interest payments, the government achieved a P49-billion primary deficit for 2016, a reversal of the P187.7-billion primary surplus recorded [in 2015],” although behind the P61.2-billion program by a fifth, it added.
As for the revenue side, the government collected a total of P2.196 trillion in tax and non-tax revenues in 2016, 4 percent higher than the P2.109 trillion in 2015. Actual 2016 revenue nonetheless missed the target of P2.257 trillion by 3 percent.
The take of the Bureau of Internal Revenue, the country’s biggest tax-collection agency rose 9 percent year-on-year to P1.567 trillion, although it failed to hit its 2016 goal of P1.62 trillion.