Deficit just under 10 percent
The containment of public spending and the increase in the revenues of the Public Investment Program allowed the government to reduce the hole in the 2011 budget created by the considerable lagging of state revenues.
Provisional figures published on Tuesday by the Finance Ministry showed the deficit of the state budget amounting to just under 10 percent of gross domestic product (at 9.97 percent), although the definitive figures regarding the size of the deficit will only be known at the end of February.
Against a revised target of 21.71 billion euros for the 2011 deficit, figures showed on Tuesday it came to 21.726 billion at the end of the year. Net revenues dropped by 1.7 percent from 2010, but the revenues of the Public Investment Program in particular grew by 22.7 percent.
As things stand now, it will take additional measures worth about 2 billion euros this year to bring the deficit down to 5.4 percent, provided that the year?s budget is executed without problems.
