ISLAMABAD: The government has earmarked Rs 83.363 billion for Education Affairs and Services in the federal budget for 2020-21 against the revised allocation of Rs 81.253 billion for the current fiscal year, showing a slight increase of around 2.5 percent.

Pakistan's public expenditure on education as percentage to GDP is estimated at 2.3 percentage in fiscal year 2019-20, which is the lowest in the region.

The bulk of expenditure of Rs 70.741 billion has been allocated for Tertiary Education Affairs and Services in budget 2020-21, which is 84.9 percent of the total allocation under this head.

The government has earmarked Rs 2.931 billion for pre-Primary & Primary Education Affairs for 2020-21 against Rs 2.83 billion for 2019-20, Rs 7.344 billion earmarked for Secondary Education Affairs & Services for 2020-21 against Rs 6.718 billion for 2019-20, Rs 1.237 billion for administration against Rs 1.407 billion for 2019-20 which was later revised to Rs 727 million.

After the 18th Constitutional amendment, education has been devolved to provinces, and federal government mainly finances higher education.

The government has increased the budgetary allocation for higher education sector from Rs 59 billion in 2019-20 to Rs 64 billion for the next fiscal year. According to the budget documents Rs 29.470 billion has been earmarked for Higher Education Commission (HEC) under the Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP) for 2020-21 against Rs 29.047 billion for 2019-20.

During fiscal year 2019-20, the government has allocated Rs 29.047 billion to HEC for implementation of 138 development projects (128 ongoing & 10 new projects) of public sector universities/higher education institutions.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2020

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