The government has been congratulated by Senate Minority Leader Aquilino “Koko” Pimentel III for the better-than-expected actual budget deficit outturn for 2023 during the Senate Plenary Deliberations on the General Principles of the 2024 General Appropriations Bill (GAB) on November 8, 2023.

The economic team led by Finance Secretary Benjamin E. Diokno was present during the plenary deliberations of the proposed 2024 GAB, which was being sponsored by Senator Juan Edgardo “Sonny” Angara.

The National Government (NG) fiscal deficit saw a 2.9 percent improvement to PHP 983.47 billion in the first three quarters of 2023 from the PHP 1.01 trillion recorded during the same period in 2022.

Year-to-date (YTD), the budget deficit figure stands at only 66 percent of the PHP 1.50 trillion full-year program.

“We’re doing better than expected,” Senator Angara said.

“Congratulations, Mr. President. You will rarely hear this from me, Mr. President. But the answers are surprising me, and I’m glad to be surprised, Mr. President. Isa lang naman ang bansa natin. We want our country to succeed,” the Senate Minority Leader commented.

Senator Pimentel also congratulated the government for its lower budget deficit program for 2024 amounting to PHP 1.35 trillion versus PHP 1.50 trillion in 2023.

“The lower deficit outturn indicates that NG debt-to-GDP ratio will continue to stabilize and allow the country to remain on track to achieving the Medium-Term Fiscal Framework [MTFF] target of 61.2 percent for 2023 and less than 60 percent by 2025,” Finance Secretary Benjamin E. Diokno said in an earlier statement.

As of end-September 2023, the country’s debt-to-GDP ratio eased to 60.2 percent from the 61 percent recorded in the second quarter of 2023.

The narrowing NG deficit for the first nine months of 2023 was due to higher revenue collections and better government expenditure performance.

Total revenues for the first nine months of the year reached PHP 2.84 trillion, a 6.8 percent increase from the PHP 2.66 trillion collected in the same period last year.

Secretary Diokno noted that the emerging total revenue collection for 2023 is estimated to be PHP 3.84 trillion to PHP 3.90 trillion, which is above the PHP 3.73 trillion level approved by the Development Budget Coordination Committee (DBCC) for the year.

Increased economic activity amid the holiday season and the expected deceleration of inflation for the remaining months of the year are seen as major drivers of the higher-than-expected revenue collection outturn for 2023.

Meanwhile, total expenditure for the first nine months of 2023 reached PHP 3.82 trillion, 4.2 percent higher year-on-year (YoY). The government disbursement accelerated significantly from 93.4 percent of the program as of June 2023 to 98.9 percent as of the end of September.

Supported by the successful submission of agencies’ catch-up plans, government spending is expected to further improve in the fourth quarter of 2023, according to Secretary Diokno.