The monthly report issued by the Kuwaiti Ministry of Finance showed that Kuwait’s budget recorded a deficit of 1.92 billion dinars (6.32 billion dollars), during the first half of the current fiscal year, amid the repercussions of the Coronavirus pandemic and its severe impact on public revenues, compared to a surplus of 88.2 million dinars (290.5 million dollars), during the same period of last fiscal year.
According to the report, the total revenues decreased by 48 percent on an annual basis during the six-month period ending last September, to 4.55 billion dinars (15 billion dollars), compared to 8.75 billion dinars (28.82 billion dollars), during the same period last year.
The data showed a decrease in oil revenues by 51.4 percent to 3.88 billion dinars (12.78 billion dollars), from 7.99 billion dinars (26.3 billion dollars), during the same period of the previous year. The rise in the deficit comes despite a 25 percent decrease in expenditures to 6.47 billion dinars, compared to 8.66 billion dinars in the comparison period.
Kuwait had reduced the volume of public expenditures for the current fiscal year 2020/2021 by 945 million dinars (3.1 billion dollars), as it revised estimates of expenditures to 21.5 billion dinars, and revenues to 7.5 billion dinars, a decrease of 53% from previous estimates at the beginning of the year.
Source (Al-Araby Al-Jadeed Newspaper, Edited)
