Adopting the theme of Economic Resilience and Transformation for the financial year 2020-2021, the government will accelerate the implementation of the 12th Five Year Plan through front-loading of its activities.
Finance Minister Namgay Tshering said the financial year 2020-2021 is going to be different compared to the past years as the government is deferring certain activities and prioritising critical activities to boost the local economy in line with the COVID-19 pandemic.
“What is different about the FY 2020-2021 is that we are going beyond what needs to be achieved in the 12th Five Year. We have contextualized some of the activities considering the current COVID-19 situation. For instance, what kind of measures are needed considering the current situation, what kind of public health containment measures are needed and what kind of measures are needed to expedite the economy,” Lyonpo said.
On being questioned by the Eminent Member Tashi Wangmo on what basis the government is going to define economic transformation, the Finance Minister said, it will be based on the Economic Contingency Plan. The government initiated the Contingency Plan in line with the coronavirus pandemic which involves accelerating, reprioritising and frontloading the 12th Five Year Plan activities.
To stimulate the economic growth, the government has started implementing an economic contingency plan in the areas of tourism, agriculture and construction such as improvement of one farm road each in all gewogs.
The Finance Minister says one of the most important opportunities in the economic transformation is food self-sufficiency. “That is why in the Economic Contingency Plan we have more than Nu 800 M under agriculture for this initiative. One transformation we are bringing is in skills up-gradation. Under the economic contingency plan, we have Build Bhutan through which we will provide a crash course to the youth for a month according to their interest. Moreover, the Labour Ministry will provide them with all the required gears to encourage and make them interested. Now when we look at economic transformation, we are looking at how and what we can achieve considering the small economy we have,” Lyonpo said.
Meanwhile, the Finance Minister added that with strict containment measures, it has decelerated economic growth of most of the countries. Lyonpo said as the country is still in the orange zone, it is important to explore measures to improve the economy. “From now on we are planning to lift the social restrictions put in place earlier by the government in phase-wise. If we are too strict with the restrictions then it will affect our already small economy,” Lyonpo added.
Finance Minister further shared that the procurement rules and regulations have been simplified to fast track procurement of works under the COVID-19 situation. All these interventions are expected to offset the GDP loss and put the economy back on track.
Sonam Pem & Phub Gyem
