IT WAS earlier reported that half of the 2016 national budget had been unused, but the Ministry of Finance has related that it is indeed its Public Sector Investment Programme (PSIP) that has experienced this slow pace of spending.The clarification follows a report by this newspaper earlier that said less than 50 percent of budgetary spending had been done by government ministries. Minister Winston Jordan who spoke on the matter said that according to the Ministry’s mid-year report it was highlighted that PSIPs had experienced low implementation and not the 2016 national budget.

According to the Minister’s report, “As at June (last) our rate of (PSIP) implementation was just over 25 percent.” While capital expenditure had increased to 89. 4 percent, it was recognised that some programmes had to be reshuffled and changes made to boost PSIP spending.

The PSIP makes up just about 25 percent of the national budget. The Finance Ministry was however unable to provide the percentage of budget expenditure since the figures were not available when requested. However PSIP implementation is being blamed on poor planning. Minister Jordan has told the Guyana Chronicle that “interference” affected the smooth functioning of implementation systems. This was directly related to operational systems within the various sectors.

Minister Jordan also believes that some agencies were “caught off-guard with an early 2016 Budget,” and that some were accustomed to being relaxed and lackadaisical in their approach to getting things done, that they were surprised by the early budget and were unable to function accordingly. President David Granger has nonetheless related government’s continuous strides toward creating a workable planning and implementation system that fixes many of the issues inherited from the previous Administration. The President said it is the government’s intention to have planning units created in all ministries ahead of the 2017 budget. He said there needs to be more careful planning in relation to spending budgetary allocations.