YEREVAN, SEPTEMBER 28, ARMENPRESS. The Armenian government approved the draft budget for 2018, which will be submitted to the Parliament.

During today’s Cabinet meeting, finance minister Vardan Aramyan said next year’s budget will be 1 trillion 307 billion drams in terms of revenues – 100 billion more than in 2017, at the expense of tax revenues.

The spending part of the budget is planned at 1 trillion 464 billion drams – against this year’s 1 trillion 360 billion. The deficit will be around 157 billion drams – against this year’s 150 billion.

The minister mentioned that nearly 80 billion drams of the 2018 deficit is planned to be received from domestic sources, and the remaining from external.

“A 4,5% economic growth is planned under the draft in 2018. We have increase the growth indicator based on our forecasts. We recorded 3,2% growth in 2017, but taking into account that the economic activity indicator is high, we expect the growth to be around 4-4,8%. Based on this we increased our expectations – forecasting 4,3% growth in 2017”, he said.

He said capital and defense spending are increased for 2018, with 175 billion drams for capital spending – against the 95 billion in 2017, and 246,8 billion drams for defense – against this year’s 209,8 billion.

He added that the government expects a 6.5% growth in the industry sector, and at least 4% growth in the agriculture sector.