The Verkhovna Rada on Thursday supported in the second reading and in general the bill No. 9346-1 with amendments to the Budget Code of Ukraine on ensuring predictability of budget policy and strengthening debt sustainability, the head of the budget committee of the parliament Roksolana Pidlasa said.
According to her, the adoption of the law ahead of schedule means the implementation of a new structural beacon (#10) under the EFF Extended Fund Facility Program with the International Monetary Fund, as well as the launch of the implementation of beacon #12 – revision of the Medium-Term Debt Management Strategy with a deadline for its publication by the end of September this year.
Pidlasa specified that the adopted law prescribes to submit to each draft law on amendments to the state budget an expert opinion of the Ministry of Finance and to consider such draft laws in the Rada if there are conclusions of the Ministry of Finance on their support.
In addition, it restores more stringent conditions for amending the law on the state budget, as defined by Article 52 of the Budget Code, leaving the exception in the conditions of martial law revision of expenditures of the security and defense sector, the MP said.
Another norm of the adopted law is the restoration of the medium-term budget planning by drawing up the Budget Declaration from January 1, 2024, which was stopped last March due to the full-scale invasion of the Russian Federation, Pidlasa pointed out.
She added that the law limits in 2023-2028 the volume of state guarantees provided by decisions of the Cabinet of Ministers to 3% of the planned revenues of the general fund of the state budget, while the limit of state guarantees provided on the basis of international treaties will be determined by the law on the state budget.
Finally, the document instructs to resume this year the development of the Strategy of State Debt Management for 2024-2026, also halted due to the full-scale invasion, providing for its submission by the Ministry of Finance to the Government for consideration by October 25, 2023 and approval by the Government within a month from the date of adoption of the law on the state budget for 2024.
President Petro Poroshenko of Ukraine has signed the law on making amendments to the Budget Code (No 9084). A statement on the Verkhovna Rada’s website says the document was returned with the signature of the president on December 22. The amendments to the Budget Code were approved by the parliament at second reading on November 22. In particular, the changes allow for agricultural produces to use up to 20% of state funding they receive for purchasing special wagons for transportation of grains and equipment for producing bioethanol and electric energy out of biomasses.
At present, the Budget Code stipulates that 15% of state funding in 2018 and 20% of state funding in 2019 are to be used by agricultural producers to purchase farming equipment from local manufacturers. In the new edition of this norm, “20%” is replaced with “up to 20%.”
