Finance Minister Ahmed Munavvar have said that the economy of Maldives will grow by 3.9 percent by the end of this year and that this is a higher rate than the year 2015.
Speaking at the parliament yesterday, while submitting next year’s budget, the minister said that this growth is due to the positive changes in the construction industry.
He further said that according to IMF the economic growth rate of developing countries will be at 3.4 percent in 2017 and that is a hopeful green signal for Maldives. He said that there were some shortcomings this year due to some problems in Maldives and abroad.
Minister noted that the slow economic growth in China led to decrease in tourists from China and also Maldives faced problems like other countries in the world due to Brexit. Minister also said that the tourism boycott campaigns by some Maldivians also had a negative effect on Maldivian economy.
“Our aim is to develop the tourism sector in 2017 and the construction industry growing constantly. Within the economy will grow in 2017. Long term plan is to grow the economy by 6 percent” said the Minister. He said that these estimates were made based on the changes on world Economy.
He further said that the inflation rate in Maldives has gone down and it is estimated that the inflation rate will be 2.4% in the year 2017. He said that at the end of this year there will be around 536 million dollars in state reserves and the figure will be increased to 605 million dollars by 2017. Minister said that in 2015 the states revenue was 17.3 billion rufiyaa and 21.4 billion Rufiyaa was spent. “Hence the 2015 budget had a 4.1 billion Rufiyaa deficit.
This is 7.8 percent as a percentage of the GDP. This year 22.5 billion Rufiyaa will be spent and 18.2 billion Rufiyaa will be received as revenue. So the budget deficit for this year will be 4.3 billion Rufiyaa. This is 7.4 percent as a percentage of the GDP. By the end of this year the national debt will be 36.9 billion Rufiyaa. This is 64 percent as a percentage of GDP. Internal debt is 72 percent and external debt is 28 percent” said the minister.