$4.78 Billon Budget Approved

2008-03-12

By Za'im Zaini

Bandar Seri Begawan - The $4.78 billion allocation for the 2008/2009 budget was unanimously approved by members of the Legislative Council after a week of deliberations and will be enforced beginning April 2008.

A big chunk of the budget?$1.05 billion ?goes for development in eight sectors which include social service, transport and communication, public utilities, ICT, public buildings, security and science, research and technology and development.

In a briefing to the Legislative Council members on the allocation of $1.05 billion, YB Pehin Orang Kaya Laila Setia Dato Seri Setia Haji Awang Abdul Rahman bin Hj Ibrahim, Minister of Finance II, said, "The implementation of projects is expected to bring development in the non-oil sector such as construction, banking and finance, insurance, financial services and property that will generate spin-offs such as wholesale and retail, transport, communication and business service."

The government has vision 2035 for the country in the next 30 years and to

achieve it a number of projects and programmes have been planned on security, socio-economy, environment and infrastructure. In the plan, a total of 1,062 projects worth $9.5 billion have been approved and will be implemented beginning this financial year.

The allocation of development is to be distributed among the key sectors. The social service sector that focuses on a number of sectors such as education, national entrepreneurship, and human resources development has been allocated $287.7 million or 27.4 per cent of the total allocation.

For industry and trade a sum of $210 million has been allocated, an increase of 182 per cent from last year. This sum is 20 per cent of the development budget and includes projects under the economic development board and to develop the economic clusters that have been identified.

The transportation and communication sector has been provided $126 million or 12 per cent of the allocation. It includes road, telecommunication and civil aviation. The public utilities have been given $123 million or 11.7 per cent, which includes among others supply of adequate clean water, improvement of water sewage for flood management and electrical supply.

Information communication technology, or ICT, has been allotted $97.4 million and will focus on improvement in ICT capacity, infrastructure, human resource, full integration of government ICT service and commercial process to achieve knowledge based economy.

Public building gets an allocation of $96.6 million in an effort to enhance government buildings, and security has been allocated $81.4 million.

A sum of $9.8 million will be channelled into science & technology and research and development. The sector will need $159 million in the next five years and will cover areas of finance, halal product development and oil downstream industry. -- Courtesy of Borneo Bulletin