đź“·henrycounsellor.co.uk
The government increased its subsidies to government-owned and controlled corporations (GOCCs) by more than half during the first four months of the year, with the bulk of the funds aiming to support the country’s irrigation sector.
Data from the Bureau of the Treasury showed that budgetary support to state-run firms during the January to April period increased by 56 percent to P47.307 billion from last year’s P30.265 billion.
During the period, subsidies for government financial institutions increased to P2.577 billion from last year’s P144 million. It cornered 5.45 percent of the aggregate.
Budgetary support for major non-financial government corporations reached P30.978 billion, up 57.91 percent from last year’s P19,618 billion. It covered 65.48 percent of the entire subsidies.
The government provides subsidies to GOCCs to cover operational expenses not funded by their own revenue.
For the first four months, 45.96 percent of the total subsidies went to the National Irrigation Administration (NIA) at P21.742 billion – a 54.61 percent increase from the P14.062 billion it received in the same period last year.
The Power Sector Assets and Liabilities Management (PSALM) secured the second-highest subsidy during the January to April period at P8 billion, a 60 percent increase from P5 billion during the same phase last year.
The National Housing Authority (NHA) came in third with P3.749 billion. In the same four-month period last year, NHA only received P836 million.
For April alone, the state disbursed a total of P6.872 billion in subsidies to state-run corporations, lower by 36.34 percent year-on-year than the P10.795 billion in 2023.
The PSALM remained as the agency extended with the highest subsidy at P8 billion in April, followed by NHA at P3.749 billion, the Philippine Crop Insurance Corporation (PCIC) at P900 million, and the Intercontinental Broadcasting Corporation (IBC)-13 at P512 million. (TCSP)
