The Finance Minister Ken Ofori-Atta has told Parliament that the government is not seeking additional funds in the 2022 mid-year budget review.

He said this is despite the underperformance of the government’s revenue handles.

Presenting the mid year budget review in Parliament on Monday July 25, Mr Ofori-Atta said “we have committed to stay within the appropriation for 2022.

“In spite of the underperforming revenue handles, we are not seeking additional funds in the mid year review. We are determined to efficiently use the windfall from the petroleum sector to make up for revenue shortfalls and aggressively improve our revenues.”

He further announced that the government is introducing a new domestic programme to support the GhanaCARES progarmme as part of the efforts to deal with the economic hardships Ghanaians are going through.

The GhanaCARES “Obaatanpa” programme provides a mechanism to consolidate private sector investment into productive sectors of the economy.

The Finance Minister recounted the challenges Ghanaians are going through due to the impact of the warfare between Russia and Ukraine as well as Covid.

“Towards 2022 Russia invaded Ukraine, a situation that worsened the already weakened global supply chain exacerbated by high conditions.

“These have had a debilitating toll on the cost and standard of living of our people. Mr Speaker, food prices are rising, fuel and transport fares are up , the cost of borrowing for businesses and for households has increased, the cedi has depreciated and the economic outlook has dipped significantly.”

He further admitted that these are difficult times for the government.

“The state of affairs is quite a painful one for me to report to you , it is hard to see our people lament about the prices of basic commodities , these are difficult times for government and indeed, for the Finance Minister.”

The government will introduce an “enhanced domestics programme to complement the Ghana cares.”

3news.com