(TAP) – The budget deficit dropped from 3,368 million dinars (MD) at the end of May 2020 to 1,422 MD at the end of May 2021, standing at 57.7% decrease, according to the document on the execution of the State budget, published recently by the Ministry of Economy, Finance and Investment Support.

This drop in the deficit is due to an improvement in budgetary resources of 13.6% to nearly 13 billion dinars, as a result of the increase of 18.3% in tax revenues to 12 billion dinars in May 2021.

The rise in tax revenues was driven by the positive development of revenues drawn from indirect taxes, notably VAT and consumer duties.

Likewise, the document reports a slight fall in budgetary expenses of 3% to 14.3 billion dinars, due to the decline in investment expenditure by 51% to 1 billion dinars, intervention expenditure by 10% to 2.7 billion dinars and management expenditure by 5.7% to 467 million dinars (MD).

However, expenditure on the wage bill is still on the rise from 8 billion dinars to 8.5 billion dinars during the period May 2020-May 2021, up 6.4%.

The wage bill accounts for 59% of total State expenditure, while investment expenditure accounts for only 7%.

Cash resources dropped by 25% to 5.3 billion dinars at the end of May 2021. They are made up of borrowing resources, up to 3.8 billion dinars of domestic loans and 2 billion dinars of external loans.

Source: TAP News Agency