MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 14th January, 2020) Russia's unimplemented budget expenses amounted to 1.115 trillion rubles ($18.23 billion), according to the Accounts Chamber, and this is seen as a serious macroeconomic problem, Accounts Chamber Chairman and former Russian Finance Minister Alexey Kudrin has said in an interview with Sputnik.
"According to the latest data, unimplemented budget expenses reached 1.115 trillion rubles. I see such expense default as a big macroeconomic problem, and colleagues from the Finance Ministry see this as well," Kudrin said.
The Accounts Chamber warned in November 2019 that the unimplemented budget expenses could amount to around 1 trillion rubles as a result of the year. It said this could be explained by abandoning prepayments during state contracts implementation. The Finance Ministry vowed to use the lapsed amount of money in 2020.
"Some events and projects were planned taking this money into account, while companies failed to get subsidies. By the end of the year, more unused money was accumulated than the previous year: it was necessary to spend 4 trillion rubles during the last three weeks of December, which is an unprecedented amount," Kudrin added.
According to the ex-finance minister, the government failed to use all the budgetary funds even despite resorting to special measures in the end of 2019. Kudrin said that the situation would be analyzed, and relevant conclusions would be presented in the 2019 budget performance report.
