{"id":69531,"date":"2023-10-11T08:35:08","date_gmt":"2023-10-11T05:35:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.kfm.co.ug\/?p=69531"},"modified":"2023-10-11T08:35:08","modified_gmt":"2023-10-11T05:35:08","slug":"govt-to-borrow-shs2-4t-for-roads-climate-smart-agriculture","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.kfm.dembefm.ug\/staging_h\/govt-to-borrow-shs2-4t-for-roads-climate-smart-agriculture\/","title":{"rendered":"Govt to borrow Shs2.4t for roads, climate-smart agriculture"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Franklin Draku<\/strong><\/p>\n

Government has ta<\/span>bled before Parliament a request to bor<\/span>row up to $650 million (Shs2.9 trillion) <\/span>from different financial institutions to <\/span>finance part of its budget. <\/span><\/p>\n

According to a request presented <\/span>by Mr Matia Kasaija, the Minister of Fi<\/span>nance, Planning and Economic Develop<\/span>ment, government will borrow up to <\/span>$295 million (Shs1.3 trillion) from the Is<\/span>lamic Development Bank and $30 mil<\/span>lion (Shs136.2 billion) from the Organi<\/span>sation of the Petroleum Exporting Coun<\/span>tries (OPEC) fund for international de<\/span>velopment for the upgrading of nation<\/span>al road project in Uganda.<\/span><\/p>\n

Mr Kasaija said the government will <\/span>borrow another $325 million (Shs1.5 <\/span>trillion) and receive a grant of up to <\/span>Standard Drawing Right of $19.5 million <\/span>(Shs88.5 billion), equivalent to $25 mil<\/span>lion (Shs113.5 billion) from the Interna<\/span>tional Development Association of the <\/span>World Bank Group to finance the Ugan<\/span>da climate-smart agricultural transfor<\/span>mation project.<\/span><\/p>\n

If approved, Uganda\u2019s public debt <\/span>will increase to more than $24 billion <\/span>(Shs108.9 trillion) putting the country <\/span>into further debt distress. Currently, the <\/span>country owes more than $13.6 billion <\/span>(Shs61.7 trillion) to external creditors ac<\/span>counting for 31.3 percent of Gross Do<\/span>mestic Product (GDP), while domestic <\/span>debt amounts to more than $8.4 billion <\/span>(Shs38.1 trillion), 19.3 percent of GDP, ac<\/span>cording to the International Monetary <\/span>Fund (IMF). <\/span><\/p>\n

IMF says while debt increased sub<\/span>stantially during the Covid-19 pandem<\/span>ic, it was already on an upward trend <\/span>previously, mainly driven by increased <\/span>borrowing to finance the country\u2019s de<\/span>velopment needs.<\/span><\/p>\n

Deputy Speaker Thomas Tayebwa <\/span>urged the Committee of National Econ<\/span>omy charged with the responsibility of <\/span>scrutinising the request not to delay the <\/span>process and submit the report with the <\/span>urgency it deserves.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThe request is referred to the Com<\/span>mittee on National Economy and the rel<\/span>evant sectoral committees as per section <\/span>155 of our rules of procedure and please <\/span>report within time. This business of say<\/span>ing we have delayed because of bench<\/span>marking and all the other things must <\/span>not happen,\u201dhe said.<\/span><\/p>\n

However, Mr Elija Okupa, the Kasilo <\/span>County MP, wondered why the minister <\/span>did not name the roads that will be up<\/span>graded under the loan request.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cWe have had outstanding issues with <\/span>some of the roads which need upgrad<\/span>ing and the President has kept promis<\/span>ing, like Kumi-Serere-Kasilo-Kagwara <\/span>road. Serere-Soroti Road was on the pro<\/span>gramme but was later removed. Apart <\/span>from that, there are also roads in other <\/span>regions. It is very important that all the <\/span>regions must benefit equally,\u201d he said.<\/span><\/p>\n

However, Mr Tayebwa said the finer <\/span>details will be dealt with by the commit<\/span>tee which will then report to the Parlia<\/span>ment.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Franklin Draku Government has tabled before Parliament a request to borrow up to $650 million (Shs2.9 trillion) from different financial institutions to finance part of its budget. According to a request presented by Mr Matia Kasaija, the Minister of Finance, Planning and Economic Development, government will borrow up to $295 million (Shs1.3 trillion) from the Islamic Development Bank and $30 million (Shs136.2 billion) from the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) fund for international development for the upgrading of national road project in Uganda. Mr Kasaija said the government will borrow another $325 million (Shs1.5 trillion) and receive a grant of up to Standard Drawing Right of $19.5 million (Shs88.5 billion), equivalent to $25 million (Shs113.5 billion) from […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":37,"featured_media":62508,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_uf_show_specific_survey":0,"_uf_disable_surveys":false,"episode_type":"","audio_file":"","cover_image":"","cover_image_id":"","duration":"","filesize":"","date_recorded":"","explicit":"","block":"","filesize_raw":"","jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":{"source_name":"","source_url":"","via_name":"","via_url":"","override_template":"0","override":[{"template":"2","single_blog_custom":"","parallax":"1","fullscreen":"0","layout":"right-sidebar","sidebar":"default-sidebar","second_sidebar":"default-sidebar","sticky_sidebar":"1","share_position":"top","share_float_style":"share-normal","show_share_counter":"0","show_view_counter":"1","show_featured":"1","show_post_meta":"1","show_post_author":"1","show_post_author_image":"1","show_post_date":"1","post_date_format":"default","post_date_format_custom":"F j, Y g:i a","show_post_category":"1","show_post_reading_time":"0","post_reading_time_wpm":"300","show_zoom_button":"0","zoom_button_out_step":"2","zoom_button_in_step":"3","show_post_tag":"1","show_prev_next_post":"0","show_popup_post":"1","number_popup_post":"3","show_author_box":"1","show_post_related":"1","show_inline_post_related":"1"}],"override_image_size":"0","image_override":[{"single_post_thumbnail_size":"crop-500","single_post_gallery_size":"crop-500"}],"trending_post":"0","trending_post_position":"meta","trending_post_label":"Trending","sponsored_post":"0","sponsored_post_label":"Sponsored by","sponsored_post_name":"","sponsored_post_url":"","sponsored_post_logo_enable":"0","sponsored_post_logo":"","sponsored_post_desc":"","disable_ad":"0"},"jnews_primary_category":{"id":"","hide":""},"jnews_social_meta":{"fb_title":"","fb_description":"","fb_image":"","twitter_title":"","twitter_description":"","twitter_image":""},"jnews_override_counter":{"override_view_counter":"0","view_counter_number":"0","override_share_counter":"0","share_counter_number":"0","override_like_counter":"0","like_counter_number":"0","override_dislike_counter":"0","dislike_counter_number":"0"},"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[245,688],"class_list":["post-69531","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-ministry-of-finance","tag-parliament"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kfm.dembefm.ug\/staging_h\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69531"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kfm.dembefm.ug\/staging_h\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kfm.dembefm.ug\/staging_h\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kfm.dembefm.ug\/staging_h\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/37"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kfm.dembefm.ug\/staging_h\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=69531"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.kfm.dembefm.ug\/staging_h\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/69531\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kfm.dembefm.ug\/staging_h\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/62508"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.kfm.dembefm.ug\/staging_h\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=69531"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kfm.dembefm.ug\/staging_h\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=69531"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.kfm.dembefm.ug\/staging_h\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=69531"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}