Members of parliament have adopted the 4,373.8 billion FCFA as 2017 state budget. The budget is up from 4,274.7 billion FCFA in 2016. The Minister of the Economy and Finance, Alamine Ousmane Mey defended the budget before the Finance and Budget Committee of the National Assembly.

The bill according to the Finance Minister was designed to boost economic growth with the underlining intention to move Cameroon towards emergence by 2035. While hailing the economic resilience of Cameroonians since 2015, Minister Alamine Ousmane Mey said priority in 2017 will be on improving the business environment.

Minister Alamine Mey added that another important area shall be agriculture. More youths shall be integrated into the production and export chain to facilitate access to more jobs. According to the finance bill, 47 % of the budget shall be used up for direct service running expenditure and 36% for investment.

The Finance Minister also stated that revenue collected in 2017 shall be used mostly to fuel the country’s investment. Part of the increased budget, the Minister stated, shall be allocated to the military in its fight against different forms of insecurity faced by the country.  In all, 67.7 % of the public investment budget in 2017 will be dedicated to infrastructural development.

CRTV