Bicameral nod to budget spurs early start for infra devt

The 2011 budget’s early ratification has given the Aquino administration an early start to spend on infrastructure development for the coming first semester. Transportation and tourism projects as well as other infrastructure developments under the public-private partnership (PPP) initiative are already in line, according to the Department of Budget Management. With the initiative in place, the government is banking on private sector investment and help in financing PPP projects to widen its fiscal space for expenditures in education and public health. "It is possible now to frontload the implementation of government infrastructure programs to take advantage of good weather in the first semester," Abad said. "The 2011 spending plan will be the first budget since the 1999 national budget that is signed into law before the fiscal year starts," he explained. The Senate and the House of Representatives ratified the proposed P1.645-trillion national budget for 2011 on Monday and Tuesday, respectively. Abad said President Benigno Aquino III would sign the 2011 General Appropriations Bill on or before Dec. 20. The early enactment is not merely a "temporal matter," for it allows the Aquino administration to have a good and early start in implementing its priority programs in poverty reduction and human development, the budget chief said. "Congress did not only agree with our proposed spending levels for conditional cash transfers, basic education and maternal and child healthcare, they also supported our proposed measures to shed daylight on the disbursement of public funds," Abad added. — VS/TJD, GMANews.TV