FINANCE Minister, Mthuli Ncube has declared a total ZW$608,5 billion budget surplus in the first half of the year amid strong economic growth predictions up to year-end on account of healing economic fundamentals.
Presenting the 2023 Mid-Term Fiscal Policy Review Friday, the Treasury boss underscored that sound public finance management during the first half ensured a healthy fiscal position, important in engendering stability of the economy.
The Policy Review comes on the back of sanity in the markets following the implementation of economic measures which have so far seen the ZWL recovering by about 40% against the greenback on both the official and parallel markets over the last one and a half months.
"Preliminary cumulative revenue collections from January to June 2023 amounted to ZWL$4.3 trillion, against expenditures of ZWL$3.7 trillion, resulting in a budget surplus of ZWL$608.5 billion. With this performance, the Budget remains on course to achieve the desired fiscal deficit target of 1.5% of GDP by year end," he said.
Ncube said that during the first half, revenue collections were generated as follows: VAT (26.5% of total revenue), Personal Income Tax (PIT) (19%), Corporate Income Tax (CIT) (14.7%), Excise Duty (12.6%), Customs Duty (7%), and IMTT (6.7%). 20.
Major expenditures were on compensation of employees (ZWL$1.4 trillion), operations (ZWL$2.9 trillion) and capital (ZWL$747.5 billion).
Government disbursed ZWL$48.2 billion for social protection programs during the first half of the year, towards BEAM (ZWL$36.1 billion), drought mitigation (ZWL$6 billion), and harmonised cash transfers (ZWL$3.2 billion).
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Resources amounting to ZWL$248.2 billion were channeled towards employment cost, drugs, medical supplies and equipment, as well as health infrastructure covering construction, rehabilitation and upgrading of health facilities including procurement of medical equipment.
An amount of ZWL$511.9 billion was disbursed towards Primary and Secondary Education and Higher and Tertiary Education with support being skewed towards wage costs for teaching and non-teaching staff.
A total of ZWL$478 billion was availed during the period January to June 2023 towards infrastructure development projects including Intergovernmental Fiscal Transfers.
Ncube expressed optimism to the effect that the implementation of the 2023 National Budget remains on course, despite the exchange rate and inflation volatility experienced during the first half of the year.
Macroeconomic stability is expected on account of recent bold interventions to close all sources of excess liquidity, favorable global economic environment, more robust financial regulation, as well as the enforcement of value for money principle in government contracts.
"The attainment of durable macroeconomic stability, combined with improved electricity supply situation is expected to spur economic growth above the projected 5.3% in 2023.
"This is important as it improves the capacity of the Budget to meet some of the emerging inescapable expenditures during the last half of 2023," added Ncube.
