KARACHI: The Sindh government has reduced the Annual Development Programme (ADP) from Rs208 billion in the current fiscal to Rs155 billion for the financial year 2020-21 due to financial constraints in the wake of Covid-19.

The ADP for the next financial year is, however, higher than the revised estimates of the ADP for the current financial year, which stood at Rs90 billion.

The total development outlay of the province for the next financial year also declined to Rs232 billion against Rs284 billion in the current financial year. The total development outlay includes the ADP, foreign project assistance, federal grants and district ADPs.

Presenting the Sindh Budget 2020-21 at the provincial assembly here on Wednesday, Chief Minister Syed Murad Ali Shah said that for the next financial year 2020-21, the administrative departments in Sindh were earlier advised to prepare proposals for the provincial ADP 2020-21 at the size same as that of 2019-20 while allocating 85% for ongoing schemes and 15% for new schemes.

However, in the post-Covid-19 scenario, with a reduction in federal transfers and funding for development, the total development outlay for Sindh for the financial year 2020-21 was proposed at Rs232.9 billion, allocating Rs155 billion for the provincial ADP and Rs15 billion for district ADP schemes.

It would be pertinent to highlight that in this context Rs54.6 billion are expected from Foreign Projects Assistance (FPA) and Rs8.3 billion from the federal government in the federal PSDP for 10 schemes being executed by Sindh government, Murad said.

The chief minister said that the government had earlier decided to keep the size of the development budget for the financial year 2020-21 for education, health, social security, poverty reduction and water and sanitation nearly the same as in the financial year 2019-20. However, in exceptional cases such as health, the allocation has been increased from Rs13.50 billion to Rs23.50 billion in order to meet the challenges of COVID-19.

The throw-forward amount in the provincial ADP 2020-21 for 2,209 schemes has reached Rs564 billion as compared to Rs606 billion for 2,705 schemes in 2019-20.

During the financial year 2019-20, Murad said that the province faced financial constraints due to COVID-19 which significantly affected development progress in the entire country. Sindh was no exception.

Sindh government budgeted Rs284 billion as total development outlay in financial year 2019-20, wherein Rs208 billion were earmarked for the provincial ADP, Rs20 billion for district ADP, Rs51 billion in foreign projects assistance and Rs4.9 billion from federal PSDP grant.

Looking at the financial constraints, stakeholder departments are likely to complete 425 schemes during 2019-20, 33 schemes less compared to 458 completed in 2018-19, Murad said.