1. Speaking at the Parliament, to present the new budget, the Finance Minister has revealed that the Foreign Currency reserve of the country has come down by usd 50 million over the past one year. The reserve at present is usd 259 Million. At internationally accepted standards, for a country of our size, the foreign currency reserve should be at least usd 400 million. But, given the international financial meltdown at present, it is unlikely that we can reach this level of reserve in the next two or three years.
2. In fact the government estimates that by the end of 2009 the reserve in our Treasury (MMA) would be usd 241 Million. This is usd 18 Million less than the current reserve. Hence, unless there is surprising turnaround in international finances we are bound to experience financial restrictions in achieving the ambitious developmental targets of the new government.
3. It has to be said that Nasheed’s government has cut wastefulness and cut government and state expenditure drastically. This is reflected in the proposed budget for 2009, which is Rf 7 Billion less than the budget for this year. Nasheed has cut down on the number of Ministers and their salaries and closed down some wasteful or unnecessary offices such as the “Maldives Government Office” in Singapore. The budget for the President’s Office and the Presidential Palace is also proposed to be drastically lower for 2009, compared to the budgets for this year.
Can we have an analysis done by economist on this. How we stand in couple of years from now and what we need to do. WE need more independent bodies involvement in all this. We need our DRs pHD holders to do research on these and bring it to public through media channels. See how its done in other parts of the world as well. Bushree good post.
ReplyDeletesingapore ga huri office bandhukurumahffahu ameen faisaluge vaan ulhey anbimeeha stroke eh jehigen singapore ah sarukaaru kharadhuga fonuvanveema e office bandhukurevuny olhumakun kamah bune mihaaru vany vaguthygothun hulhuvaafa anekka shehenaaz ebalyga etha ove maruvejjiyya anekka ethanah dhiya 24 memberunnaaeku aharemen dhivehinge faaisaa kharadhukoffa male gennan jeheynethaa!!!!!!!!shehenaazakyves anni ah heyo verikameh hoadhadheyn adhi anni aa eku kuraa hurihaa amaleh kuramun dhiya ekakah vaathy dhoa -SIFAINNAH NASEYHAIYTHERI VUMAH ARAA HUNNEVI KAANAL-
ReplyDeletewhat matters is the reserves in months of imports. At the moment our gross reserves are at just a little over 2 months of imports - this is a 15 year low. With the international financial meltdown there’s no way reserves are going to increase to US$380.8 million or 3.2 months of imports by the end of the year, as has been predicted by MMA. The other issue is the way we count our reserves. The money kept by commercial banks as part of the Mimimum Reserve Requirement (MRR) also for a part of our reserves. This isnt something we can touch.
ReplyDelete"put money in thy purse"
ReplyDeleteWill there be a devaluation
ReplyDelete