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State Duma approves amendments to 2018 budget in third reading

According to the document, in 2018 it is proposed to redistribute about $2.5 bln in priority areas

MOSCOW, June 21. /TASS/. The State Duma (lower house of parliament) has passed amendments to the law on 2018 federal budget and the planned period of 2019-2020 submitted by the government in the third reading.

Priorities

According to the document, in 2018 it is proposed to redistribute about 162.8 bln rubles ($2.5 bln) in priority areas.

The government has registered a new allocation of 224.7 bln rubles ($3.5 bln) from the budget. In particular, 5 bln rubles ($77 mln) will be directed to the capitalization of Rosselkhozbank, another 5 billion rubles will be contributed to the authorized capital of Promsvyazbank to provide loans to the main contractors of the state defense order. The bill envisages the support of domestic carmakers by allocating subsidies worth 36.4 bln rubles ($568 mln).

It is planned to reduce the appropriations envisaged to provide interbudgetary transfers to Russia’s Pension Fund for a total of 65.462 bln rubles ($1.02 bln).

Changes to the second reading

According to head of the Duma committee on budget and taxes Andrei Makarov, the total amount of redistributed federal budget funds as part of the second reading is 26.194 bln rubles ($408 mln).

The reserve fund of the president will be replenished by 6.7 bln rubles ($104 mln) at the expense of the closed part of the budget.

The main amendments to the budget

On June 7, the State Duma (lower house of parliament) passed amendments to the law on 2018 federal budget and the planned period of 2019-2020 submitted by the government in the first reading. Amendments envision an increase in budget revenues by 1.82 trillion rubles ($29.3 bln) in 2018, particularly through a surge in oil and gas revenues of 1.76 trillion rubles ($28.3 bln) and a rise in non-oil and gas revenues amounting to 59.8 bln rubles ($964 mln). Revenues will increase by 1.7 percentage points to 17.4% of GDP.

Budget expenditures will go up by 61.9 bln rubles ($998 mln) in 2018 to 16.6 trillion rubles ($267.8 bln), or 16.9% of GDP. Deficit of federal budget will turn into surplus this year amounting to 481.8 bln rubles ($7.7 bln), or 0.5% of GDP.