Budget releases accelerate in January

MANILA, Philippines — With a record-high P5.02-trillion budget this year, the government accelerated its issuance of notices of cash allocation (NCAs) by 18 percent in January to make sure state agencies sustain their funding for programs and projects.

The Department of Budget and Management (DBM) said NCA releases went up to P265.28 billion in January from P224.08 billion a year ago, leading to an improvement in utilization rate from 72 to 73 percent.

Over two-thirds of the NCA issuances, at P175.99 billion, went to line departments, while the remaining P89.3 billion was directed to other agencies, especially state-run firms and local governments, including the Metropolitan Manila Development Authority (MMDA).

By sector, line departments registered a utilization rate of 63 percent or P111.48 billion for the NCAs they received in January. Other agencies used up 93 percent or P83.02 billion.

By recipient, the MMDA recorded the highest utilization rate at 98 percent or P207.22 million, out of the P211.67 million cash budget it obtained.

The Office of the Vice President spent 96 percent or P45.55 million of its NCAs worth P47.58 million.

Local governments that dealt with a recent spike in COVID-19 cases due to the spread of the Omicron variant utilized 93 percent or P80.13 billion of their P85.75 billion NCAs.

Meanwhile, the Department of Foreign Affairs registered the worst utilization rate in January at just 13 percent of its NCAs totaling P1.41 billion.

The Department of Tourism came in second with a utilization rate of 25 percent of P264 million, while the Department of Social Welfare and Development was next with 30 percent of P4.74 billion.

Last year, the DBM recorded an all-time high of P4.1 trillion worth of NCAs as the government expanded its emergency measures to recover from the pandemic. State agencies booked a utilization rate of 96 percent, leaving just P162 billion unused at the close of 2021.

National and local agencies, including state-owned firms, get their NCAs from the DBM to cover the cash requirements of their programs and projects.

NCAs can only be used either through cash disbursements – where checks and advice to debit account are issued to creditors and payees – or outstanding checks – where checks are issued, but have yet to be encashed by the recipient.