by Linda Straker
- Lower House will approve supplementary budget on Friday, 3 September
- Five different ministries are expected to benefit
- Prime Minister Mitchell was out of the state on personal business
Approximately 9 months after approving the 2021 Budget, the Government of Grenada will be seeking parliamentary approval for a supplementary budget of EC$54,910,146.
Members of the Lower House are set to give that authorisation when they meet for a session on Friday, 3 September 2021. The Upper House will give approval at a later date.
“There may be issued from the Consolidated Fund and applied to the service of the State of Grenada for the fiscal year 1stJanuary to 31st December 2021, a sum not exceeding Fifty-four Million, Nine Hundred and Ten Thousand, One Hundred and Forty-six dollars ($54,910,146.00) in addition to the sums already appropriated for that fiscal year,” said the Supplementary Appropriation Act 2021.
Five different ministries are expected to benefit from the supplementary budget with the Ministry of Finance, Economic Development, Physical Development, Public Utilities, and Energy receiving the largest allocation of EC$2 million for recurrent expenditure and EC$36,434,719 for capital expenditure. In total, the sum allocated to the Ministry of Finance will be EC$38,434,719.
The Ministry of Health and Social Security will receive an injection of funds of EC$10,204,000. The Ministry of Education, Human Resource Development, Religious Affairs and Information will be receiving EC$5,171,722 while the Ministry of Agriculture, Lands, and Forestry will be receiving an additional EC$100,000.
The Royal Grenada Police Force which falls under the Ministry of National Security whose minister is Prime Minister Dr Keith Mitchell, will be receiving approximately EC$1 million. According to the minutes of the Finance Committee which was held on 26 August 2021 via the Zoom platform, the money will be used for the “payments of increments, additional recruits (staff) and insufficient allocations on the original Budget.”
Prime Minister Mitchell was out of the state on personal business and did not participate in the meeting. It was chaired by then Acting Prime Minister Gregory Bowen who is also the current Minister for Finance.
It is standard practice for the government to approve a supplementary budget no less than 6 months after the approval of the annual budget.
