BANGKOK, 11 June 2014 – The National Council for Peace and Order on Tuesday endorsed the framework of the fiscal 2015 budget, maintaining the target of realizing a balanced budget in the year 2017.
NCPO chief, General Prayuth Chan-ocha, chaired Tuesday’s meeting to deliberate the 2015 budget and to follow up on implementation of NCPO policies.
Somsak Chotirattanasiri, director of the Budget Bureau, said after the meeting that the framework for the 2.575 trillion baht budget was endorsed. The fiscal 2015 budget would be larger than the fiscal 2014 budget by 50 billion baht. It would also be an unbalanced budget, incurring a deficit of 250 billion baht; the state’s revenue for the 2015 fiscal has been projected at 2.325 trillion baht. 456 billion baht of the entire budget will be used for investment.
According to Somsak, state agencies will submit detailed budget plans to the Bureau of the Budget by July 15, and the latter will send the slightly revised fiscal budget to the NCPO for approval. After the approval, the legislative sector will deliberate the budget bill in September, which should allow the bill to be enforced by October 1.
Tuesday’s meeting also emphasized on having all state agencies disburse all the remaining funds allocated to them under the 2014 fiscal budget. So far, only 36% of this fiscal year’s budget has been drawn upon.
