Engineer Zmarak Khan Achakzai, the Minister of Finance for the province of Balochistan, recently revealed a Rs750 billion budget for the upcoming fiscal year 2023-24.
Balochistan Assembly Speaker Jan Muhammad Jamali presided over the meeting, which was attended by Ministers, including Chief Minister Mir Abdul Quddus Bizenjo.
In his budget statement, the country’s finance minister announced that the Public Sector Development Programme (PSDP) would get around Rs229.301 billion, while non-development spending would be capped at Rs437 billion.
According to Achakzai, there would be no taxes in the upcoming fiscal year of 2023-24. According to him, the health care budget in the upcoming fiscal year is Rs65 billion, whereas the budget shortfall is Rs49 billion.
He announced a 35% pay rise for teachers in grades 1 through 16, and a 30% rise for teachers in grades 17 through 22. In addition, there will be a rise of 17.5% for retirees.
The educational system would get a total of Rs87 billion. He revealed that Rs53 billion have been allocated in the budget to ensure public safety.
According to him, Balochistan’s overall revenue for the upcoming fiscal year is expected to be Rs701 billion, and Rs170 billion has been earmarked for 4,721 current initiatives.
He announced that Rs58 billion had been set aside to fund 5,068 new initiatives, and that 100 new primary schools would be upgraded to secondary status and 50 primary schools would be upgraded to high school status.
The minister announced that Rs12 billion have been earmarked in the budget for the improvement of basic and secondary education, and that 863 new posts would be established for the advancement of the education sector.
At least Rs1.5 billion has been set aside for livestock development, with another Rs5.4 billion set out for the animal affairs sector’s non-developmental purposes.
The budget of Balochistan covers all the sections of society
Achakzai said that most people in Balochistan worked with livestock in some capacity, and that Rs320 million had been allocated for fattening sheep and goats, and Rs630 million had been allocated to promote rural poultry farming in Balochistan, as part of a Prime Minister of Pakistan programme.
According to him, 2,800 widows and low-income families in the province’s districts of Gwadar, Dera Bugti, Kachhi, Nasirabad, Jhal Magsi, Harnai, Jafarabad, and Shirani received 28,000 hens this year. He pointed out that the remaining districts had already received their rural chicken distribution.
He explained that farmers across the province were spared significant financial loss because to the swift government response, which had resulted in the purchase of vaccines for the cows at a cost of Rs50 million. More than Rs180 million was disbursed to improve farmers’ living conditions as much as possible.
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