As the federal government approaches the tail end of its time in office, the development spending - on and through various divisions and ministries - has continued. Latest data released by the Planning Commission shows that the Planning & Development division had released Rs136.3 billion for the projects falling under the Public Sector Development Programme between July 1, 2012 and March 8, 2013.
A slight acceleration in PSDP spending is seen in the months of February and early March, as PSDP funding made its way to a variety of divisions, including Finance, Housing & Works, etc. and block releases to the FATA region.
The government divisions that received significant PSDP funding from their allocation in the 36 weeks since the fiscal year commenced in July 2012 include Communications (Rs11.97 bn), P&D (Rs11.06 bn), Kashmir affairs & Gilgit-Baltistan affairs (Rs10.87 bn), the PAEC (Rs9.98 bn), Railways (Rs10.05 bn), FATA (Rs10.04 bn), Housing & Works (Rs6.17 bn), and Finance (Rs5.16 bn).
The Higher Education Commission received till March 8 about Rs7.89 billion against its FY13 development allocation of Rs15.8 billion. Wapdas water-sector projects received Rs31.8 billion, which included major outlays on projects like raising of the Mangla Dam, and development works on Kacchi Canal, Rainee Canal, etc. About Rs3.11 billion was released to Wapda for land acquisition of the Diamer Bhasha Dam.
In FY13, the P&D Division has been authorised to release upto Rs233 billion out of the total Rs360 billion portfolio of federal PSDP. So far, it has exhausted 58.5 percent of its mandated limit, and as per the official funds release mechanism, the P&D division can disburse up to 65 percent of the limit by March end, and 35 percent in the last quarter ending June 30, 2013.
The federal government is said to have already exhausted Rs27 billion under Special Programmes (part of the Fy13 PSDP budget) through the cabinet and finance divisions. A few days still remain before the federal government calls it a day. Without breaching the laid down funds release mechanism, the government can still disburse, through the P&D Division, another Rs15 billion worth of PSDP funds.
But diverting the funds from existing projects to new, hasty development schemes has been under scrutiny recently, which may force the government to avoid this temptation.
The skewed development priorities of the federal government, as well as administrative inefficiencies in government divisions have, for years, reduced the efficacy of PSDP projects. Now, reportedly, there is a proposal to jack up the PSDP budget in next fiscal year to Rs450 billion - a 25 percent hike YoY. Far from rationalizing the PSDP portfolio and identifying the high-public welfare projects, it seems that the next government would be reduced to just putting a stamp on that proposal when it enters office in June.
=============================================================================
FEDERAL PSDP FY13 (RS BN.)
=============================================================================
Sector Ongoing Throw FY13 budgetary FY13
Projects Forward allocations Releases*
(No.) (Cost) (Govt. Funds) (Foreign Aid) (Jul. 1
- Mar. 8)
=============================================================================
Infrastructure 345 2,320.3 125.6 85.6 73.9
Social 691 551.8 127.4 8.4 58.2
Others 74 41.6 3.0 0.0 1.4
ERRA - - 4.0 6.0 2.8
260.0 100.0
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Total 1,110 2,913.7 360.0 136.3
-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Data source: Planning Commission * Against Rs233.0 bn
=============================================================================
Comments
Comments are closed for this article.