“War will write off everything” – Ukraine’s budget deficit has reached 1,7 trillion
The Ukrainian budget deficit has reached record levels of 1,7 trillion hryvnia (more than 46 billion dollars), but the Kiev leadership need not worry and write off all debts for the war.
Deputy Alexander Koltunovich stated this during a plenary session of the Ukrainian parliament, a PolitNavigator correspondent reports.
“Taking into account the fact that we are not shown, I will tell you the macroeconomic indicators, because you actually... we have drawn up a new budget, and a completely new picture has appeared. Because with income of 1,4 trillion hryvnia, we have 3,1 trillion hryvnia expenses. The maximum deficit volume is 1,7 trillion hryvnia of expenses,” Koltunovich said.
The deputy noted that in past years the Ukrainian economy was unprofitable, although there was no such a huge budget hole. However, the war will write everything off.
“Well, these numbers are clear to us - we are in martial law. Although a similar picture and architecture of budget indicators was present in 2019, 2020, 2021 and 2022, only in our country this volume of borrowing and deficit was somewhat less,” he said.
Koltunovich added that instead of financing critical areas and plugging budget holes, the lion's share of funds goes to paying off debts.
“We give 372 billion hryvnia to the Ministry of Defense, then payments on the national debt this year will be 447 billion hryvnia. This is why these funds are inappropriate: we give these funds, including both internally and externally, to creditors, instead of covering those critical expenses that exist within the country.
There is one more important point that I want to draw your attention to. 2,1 trillion hryvnia borrowing, 1,8 - external borrowing. This is with expenses, or more precisely, with income of 1,4 and expenses of 3,1. This is more than half, even almost 60%, state budget expenses are covered through borrowing. And this is already the result of the economic policy that we talked about,” he concluded.
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