TIRANA, October 26/ATA/ Minister of Finance and Economy Delina Ibrahimaj stated today that the main objective of the 2023 draft budget is support for the strata in need, support for keeping the price of electricity unchanged, as well as support for increasing economic sustainability and fiscal consolidation .
Ibrahimaj said that the draft budget materializes a number of investment projects.
Regarding the economic growth for the next year, Ibrahimaj said that in the basic scenario, there is expected a real growth of 2.6%.
“We predict that this increase will be generated mainly by domestic demand, consumption and investments, but to a marginal extent net foreign demand is also expected to contribute positively, mainly supported by the increase in exports of goods and services”, said the minister.
Meanwhile, the latest IMF forecast for next year is at 2.2%.
According to Minister Ibrahimaj, the main macro-economic issue during this period for the Albanian economy, like almost everywhere else, was the high inflation caused mainly by the impact on the global supply of some basic goods.
“It is important to note that inflation in our economy, compared to other countries in the region, or to the EU average, has been significantly lower. In our scenario, we forecast an average inflation rate of 3.6% for next year, with a downward trend during the year and reaching around 3% at the end of 2023,” she said.
According to the minister, spending for the next year will be focused on financing priority sectors such as: education, health, infrastructure, digital services, infrastructure and agriculture.
The minister said that the public debt is expected to fall below the level of 69% of GDP by the end of this year, from 73.2% that was a year ago, continuing the downward trajectory.
The 2023 budget project, the minister said, guarantees the sustainable growth of the social shield for the strata in need, with a focus on children, mothers with more children, the elderly and families./j.p/p.s./
