Expert reflects on the year 2015

2015 has been a challenging year as it was a year where the commodity prices were low and the LNG Prices fell at the end of 2014 and start of 2015.

This inevitably required the government to make adjustments to both expenditure and to ensure that revenue was brought in from all available sources because of the repercussion of taxes from the Mining Oil and Gas Sectors.

According to the Executive Director of the Institute of National Affairs Paul Barker, in 2015 various adjustments were made in the budget, various reductions were made to avoid building up of the levels of debt, way beyond the budgeted levels of debt but again there were concerns where some of the areas that had some budget cuts were priority areas of public expenditure.

Barker said that there is a vital need of the public to be aware of the status of the budget and to help keep the Government accountable by being vocal on priority areas.

“We must learn from the 1990’s and 2000 where we thought we were mining rich and borrowed ahead of time before the benefits came in rather than waiting till the benefits came through,” he said.

PNGFM/ ONE PNG