The fourth consecutive year the State revenue surpassed the estimate

	Customs Departments assigned additional targets of State revenue
	By the end of the first quarter, tax sector achieves revenue collection of 26%

Minister of Finance Dinh Tien Dung reports to the National Assembly

Estimated to surpass VND 46 trillion

On behalf of the Government, Minister of Finance Dinh Tien Dung said that basically, all socio-economic development targets and tasks, including financial and State budget targets in 2019, will be completed. The State revenue in the first nine months reached 77.5 percent of the estimate, the highest level compared to the same period of recent years; increased by 10.1 percent compared to 2018. The State revenue for the whole year is expected to surpass 3.3 percent (VND 46 trillion) compared to estimates.

The central budget revenue is estimated to exceed VND 8-11 trillion and this is the second consecutive year exceeding the estimate. The rate of mobilisation into the State budget reached 23.7 percent of GDP, revenue from taxes and fees reached 20.2 percent of GDP. It is the result of great efforts to restructure the State expenditure of the Government and localities, especially reducing recurrent expenditures, increasing expenditure for development and investment, tightly controlling deficit spending, reducing public debt and drastically regulating State budget spending for savings and efficiency.

State budget expenditure in nine months reached 63.1 percent of the estimate, of which, recurrent expenditure was 73.4 percent, expenditure for repayment was 68.4 percent and expenditure for development and investment was 44.8 percent. It is expected that the recurrent expenditure and expenditure for repayment of the whole year reached the estimate; but expenditure for development and investment is still difficult. The Government and the Prime Minister have directed ministries, agencies and localities to review the public investment plan for 2019 and remove difficulties, including cutting and transferring capital, speeding up implementation progress.

The Minister of Finance emphasised that State budget deficit spending in 2019 is estimated at 3.4 percent of GDP; public debt is 56.1 percent of GDP, government debt is 49.2 percent of GDP and external debt is 45.8 percent of GDP, lower than the estimate.

The local budget deficit decreased compared to the estimate approved by the National Assembly (down VND) 12,500 billion. During the period of budget stability, 16 provinces and cities balanced their budgets and adjusted the central budget with stable development. Other localities had high revenue and can balance the budget in the next stable period.

By 2020, the Government will build a total State budget revenue estimate up by 3.8 percent compared to the estimate in 2019. Domestic revenue is expected to rise by 12.5 percent ​​compared to the estimate in 2019, accounting for 83.6 percent of the total balanced State budget revenue. For State budget expenditure estimate, the Government plans to increase expenditure for development and investment by VND 41.3 trillion (up 9.6 percent) compared to the estimate in 2019, accounting for 26.9 percent of total budget expenditure; of which, expenditure for development and investment from the central budget will account for 46.7 percent of total investment expenditure.

The estimated current expenditure accounts for 60.5 percent of the State budget and continues to decrease over the years. Especially, although there are many difficulties, the Government plans to spend VND 61,500 billion to reform salary from January 1, 2020 with an addition of VND 110,000 per month and the corresponding pension increase. If the increase in pension is approved by the National Assembly, the basic salary in 2020 will be VND 1,600,000/month.

Chairman of the NA’s Finance - Budget Committee Nguyen Duc Hai

Discuss to provide effective control solutions

Verifying this content, Chairman of the NA’s Finance - Budget Committee Nguyen Duc Hai sated the verification authority highly appreciated the efforts of the Government, ministries, sectors, localities, the business community, people, the finance sector and the coordination of agencies in the political system that have overcome difficulties and challenges to accomplish financial and budgetary tasks set for 2019.

In addition to positive results, the Finance and Budget Committee raised several issues that need to be assessed for drastic measures in the near future such as the revenue from taxes and fees is still low, the actual domestic revenue is not high; revenues of many localities do not reach estimates; tax debt is still high, and the disbursement of investment capital is low.

The verification report of the Finance and Budget Committee also basically unified with the Government's report on the socio-economic forecast in 2020, agreed with the Government's proposal of total State revenue estimate and agreed on the principles and orientations for allocating the State budget expenditure estimates in 2020 and the estimated total State budget expenditure increase by VND 113.8 trillion (7 percent) compared to the 2019.

For the National Assembly to have sufficient basis to consider and decide on the assessment of the implementation of the state budget in 2019, the State budget estimate and the plan for central budget allocation in 2020, Chairman of the NA’s Finance - Budget Committee Nguyen Duc Hai requests deputies of the National Assembly focus on discussing the assessment of the State budget revenue collection and expenditure; emerging issues in State budget revenue and expenditure management in 2019; deficit spending and solutions for management, balance of the State budget in 2019; total revenue, total expenditure, structure of state budget revenues and expenditures and level of State budget deficit spending in 2020; solutions to implement the State budget estimate in 2020.