President Benigno Aquino III has signed the 2016 national budget worth P3.002 trillion, of which P829.6 billion or 27.6% has been allocated for economic services covering areas such as infrastructure, agriculture, transport, and communications.
The 2016 general appropriations is 15.2% higher than this year’s P2.606-trillion budget.
In a speech after signing the 2016 General Appropriations Act, Aquino said the target is to allot 5% of the country’s gross domestic product for infrastructure development, higher than this year’s 4% share.
Accounting for the biggest share or 36.8% of the budget (P1.106 trillion) is social services, which covers education, health, housing, livelihood, and community-driven projects.
The second largest went to economic services and the third largest to general public services with P517.9 billion or 17.3%. Defense and security will receive P129.1 billion, garnering the lowest allocation with a 4.3% budget share. Still, the new allocation reflects an increase of 11.5% from 2015 to address the budgetary needs of modernizing the Armed Forces of the Philippines in light of the West Philippine Sea territorial disputes, according to the Department of Budget and Management.
The Department of Public Works and Highways (DPWH) received a budget of P400.4 billion to complete national road and flood control projects while the Department of Transportation and Communications (DOTC) has been allotted a P48.5 billion.
“For six straight years, the administration consistently focused the budget on programs that have great impact on the needs of the poorest communities, while being aware of the need to ensure that the allocations for services also function as long-term investments towards lasting inclusive growth,” Budget Secretary Florencio Abad said in a statement.
“It can be gleaned that for every P100 of the 2016 budget, around P64 will be spent on social and economic services. This clearly shows how the government is wisely investing on its people, with the foresight of supporting services that will keep serving their needs long into the future,” Abad added.
In terms of departments, the Department of Education still has the highest budget for next year with P437 billion. DPWH is next, followed by the Department of National Defense with P175.2 billion. The rest of the 10 departments with the highest budgets are the Department of Interior and Local Government (P154.5 billion), Department of Health (P128.5 billion), Department of Social Welfare and Development (P111 billion), Department of Agriculture (P94 billion), DOTC, Department of Finance (P33.2 billion), and Department of Environment and Natural Resources (P24.8 billion).
Image courtesy of Stuart Miles at FreeDigitalPhotos.net
