By A Staff Reporter
Kathmandu, Dec. 17: By the end of the first five months of the current Fiscal Year 2021/22, only 6.46 per cent of the capital budget has been mobilised.
The government has spent only Rs. 28.4 billion of the total capital allocation of Rs. 439.65 billion set aside for this year till Wednesday, according to the Financial Comptroller General Office (FCGO).
This year’s budget performance has remained poorer compared to the previous fiscal when the capital expenditure stood at 10.13 per cent in the first five months.

While low capital budget expenditure has been a perennial problem in case of Nepal, Finance Minister Janardan Sharma, after presenting the Replacement Bill for the budget at the parliament, had said that he would reform the government mechanism in order to spend at least 10 per cent of the total development budget each month.
As there was no improvement in budget mobilisation, FM Sharma said the other day that budget implementation had just started and government was making arrangements to increase it. According to him, government spending would gather speed in the next couple of months.

Experts said that low spending of development budget had also contributed to the current liquidity pressure in the banks and financial institutions.
Likewise, business community said in a programme organised at the Federation of Nepalese Chambers of Commerce and Industry the other day that the liquidity shortage had increased the interest rate making the investment in business and industries dearer.

However, total government expenditure in the five-month period has improved slightly this year with the mobilisation of 23.7 per cent of Rs. 1632.8 billion budget. Last year’s expenditure was 22.11 per cent. In the current year, financing has improved with 21.8 per cent against last year’s 6.81 per cent.

But the revenue collection has improved this year with 34.93 per cent progress while it was 29.52 per cent last year.
Of the total government income in first five months, tax revenue is Rs. 380.2 billion and non-tax revenue Rs. 32.1 billion. Likewise, other receipts amount Rs. 31.39 billion.

The revenue target for current year is Rs. 1180.6 billion, about Rs. 169 billion higher than that of last year.