Kazakh Accounts Committee proposes to draw up budget for only one year

Kazakh Accounts Committee proposes to draw up budget for only one year

Last year, expenditures from the National Fund exceeded the amount received there, Chairperson of the Accounts Committee for Control over Execution of the National Budget Natalya Godunova said at a joint session of the chambers of Parliament. She stressed that the National Fund was created to save financial resources and reduce the dependence of the budget on the situation on the world commodity markets.

“Since 2015, the National Fund has been in the active phase of consumption. We are not including the year from 2019 to 2020 here, since that time there was a real need to fund anti-crisis measures related to the pandemic. However, the situation has improved significantly in 2021. Despite the Head of State’s instruction that the national budget should not be based on the use of the National Fund, in 2021 spending amounted to 4.5 trillion tenge, while revenues amounted to 4.3 trillion,” Natalya Godunova, Chairperson of the Accounts Committee for Control over Execution of the National Budget, said.

Besides, Godunova made a proposal to the Government members and MPs to reduce the period of budget planning from three years to one year. She noted that it is necessary to ensure the continuity of decisions and guarantee business and investors the implementation of the commitments already made.

“The three-year budget remained a formality. It takes a lot of time to form it. During budget implementation, only the first base year is specified and corrected; we do not even look at subsequent years. While planning the regular budget for the next period, some of the previously supported expenses may generally fall out of the new budget, and as a result, there are unfinished targets that are not secured by funding. In our opinion, the time has come to raise the issue of returning budget planning for one year,” Godunova added.

 

 

Translation by Assem Zhanmukhanova

Editing by Saule Mukhamejanova