KUWAIT CITY: Kuwait’s provisional budget surplus shrunk in the first nine months of this fiscal year as spending rose 18 percent and income was unchanged, according to official figures released yesterday.
The provisional budget surplus of the Opec member dropped 11 percent to KD14.34bn ($50.7bn) at the end of December compared to KD16.1bn in the same period of the previous year, according to figures posted on the ministry of finance website.
Spending in the nine-month period was KD9.64bn compared to just KD8.16bn in the same period of the previous fiscal year. Revenues in the first three quarters of the 2013/2014 fiscal year came in at KD24bn, slightly less than the KD24.26bn posted in the same period of the previous year.
Oil income, which makes up over 92 percent of total revenues, dropped slightly from KD22.84bn in the 2012-2013 fiscal year to KD22.2bn in the current year. Spending on development projects has been hampered by political disputes in recent years, but picked up slightly in recent months with the award of a number of megaprojects.
afp
