The Parliamentary Committee on Economy and Finance approved on Thursday a Normative Act for the revision of the 2020 budget.

During the committee meeting, the Deputy Minister of Finance and Economy, Adela Xhemali said that the Normative Act does not affect the key macro-fiscal parameters of the budget, while through it was ensured the implementation of two priorities: financing the bonus in the amount of Lek 5,000 for each pensioner at the end of the year and financial aid scheme.

She also noted that capital expenditures were reallocated in order to increase the efficiency of their use.

Referring to the most important allocations, the normative act determines the allocation of Lek 3.4 billion fund for financing the end-of-year bonus for the category of pensioners, the additional funds in the amount of Lek 1.4 billion for financing some additional needs of the Ministry of Health and Social Protection, mainly for the financial aid scheme, as a result of the specifics of its use during 2020, characterized by the social consequences of the Covid-19 pandemic, as well as the increase of funds in the amount of Lek 420 million in the item of subsidy of water supply and sewerage companies in order to settle arrears in the item social and health insurance contributions and profit tax.

Also, the Normative Act determines additional funds for the Ministry of Infrastructure and Energy in the amount of Lek 200 million. At the same time, additional financing of Lek 2.9 billion is foreseen for the water supply and sewerage sector nationwide, for the improvement of the water supply of the population as well as the financing of Lek 982 million for urban waste processing projects.

The Normative Act provides additional funding in the amount of Lek 673 million for two priority projects of the Central Election Commission (CEC), namely “Electronic Voter Identification Project” and “Pilot Project of Electronic Voting and Counting”, as well as the allocation of a fund of Lek 97 million for the establishment of support systems for the operation of the building of Special Anti-Corruption Prosecution (SPAK) and National Bureau of Investigation (BKH).

The head of the Committee, Anastas Angjeli said that the macroeconomic framework from the implementation of this Normative Act has not been affected.

According to Angjeli, as a result of a slowdown of economic contraction in the third quarter of 2020, economy is projected to decline by 4.4% during 2020, contrary to what was previously predicted for an economic decline of over 6%.

“Due to the two shocks that the Albanian economy received, the earthquake and the pandemic, the state of macroeconomic indicators, especially in economic growth, has experienced a contraction. So far, economy is projected to decline by 4.4%; budget deficit is seen at 6.7% and public debt at the level of 79.8%,” Angjeli noted.