MoF authorizes Rs. 84 bn budget to NRA

Kathmandu, July 23: The National Reconstruction Authority (NRA) has been authorized to mobilize necessary budget in the reconstruction and rehabilitation works in the current Fiscal Year 2016/17.

The Ministry of Finance gave a nod to the Authority to spend Rs. 84 billion budget on the reconstruction drive.

Finance Minister Bishnu Prasad Paudel has allocated Rs. 142 billion rupees for the post-quake reconstruction.

The NRA informed that out of the authorized budget, Rs. 12.29 billion will be provided by the government while the Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) will extend assistance of Rs. 1.83 billion, European Union Rs. 11 billion, China Rs. 500 million and India will provide Rs. 12.5 billion as grant.

Similarly, KFW Germany, South Korea and Asian Development Bank (ADB) will provide grant assistance of Rs. 3 billion, Rs. 650 million and Rs. 980 million respectively. Rs. 1.5 billion will be used from the Joint Reconstruction Fund.

Likewise, loan assistance of Rs. 13.26 billion will be received from the Official Development Assistance (ODA), Rs. 9.55 billion from the ADB, Rs. 11.66 from JICA and Rs. 5 billion from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

As the authorization for budget mobilization was sent earlier, the NRA has hoped for effective implementation of the budget.

"Budget allocation to various agencies will be easier this year as the money has been assigned to 13 different topics unlike only four topics in the last fiscal year," NRA said in a press statement.

 The reconstruction body has informed that budget would be assigned to the programmes mentioned in the Post Disaster Need Assessment (PDNA) and Post-Disaster Reconstruction Framework (PDRF).

"The Executive Committee of the NRA will allow doling out the money to the programmes submitted to the Line Ministry Budgetary Information System by the respective ministries as per the PDNA and PDRF," said the Authority.

As the establishment of the Authority was delayed and much of the time was used up in the preparation of the policy framework and data collection, the government couldn't spend much of the reconstruction budget last year.

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