Budget speech today

By A Staff Reporter Kathmandu, May 29: The budget for the upcoming fiscal year 2022/23 is to be presented at the joint session of the Federal Parliament at 4 PM on Sunday. According to the Constitutional provision, the government will present the budget for the coming fiscal year on Sunday to implement the provision of presenting the budget on Nepali month of Jestha 15 every year.

Earlier, President Bidya Devi Bhandari had presented the policies and programmes of the government for the upcoming fiscal year 2022/23 at the joint session of the Federal Parliament on Tuesday. The policies and programmes have given priorities to product and enhancement of productivity, access to energy and water, formation of human capital and employment creation and sustainable development with ecological balance.

The Ministry of Finance had collected suggestions from every sector and general people through various means to make the budget effective and accelerate economic growth of the country. The government is planning to focus on the agriculture sector to substitute imports of agriculture produce, the growing of which is becoming a challenge for the economy. The government is preparing a budget of around Rs. 1,700 billion for the next fiscal year 2022/23.Finance Minister (FM) Janardan Sharma has informed Speaker Agni Prasad Sapkota about the budget. On Saturday morning, FM Sharma briefed Speaker Sapkota about the budget and priorities for the coming fiscal year. Economists and other concerned bodies have suggested that the government should introduce a realistic budget with solid policies and programmes to accelerate the economy by increasing domestic production and productivity.

The budget should focus mainly on increasing the production and productivity of agricultural commodities, promoting the use of electricity to reduce the consumption of petroleum products and making the sources of foreign currency earnings effective to overcome the present challenges in the national economy, they suggested.