Baku, Azerbaijan, Dec. 9
By Temkin Jafarov, Umid Niayesh - Trend:
Iran's next year budget bill targets to control the country economy's stagflation problem, former member of Iranian parliament, Ali Mazroui told Trend on Dec. 9.
Stagflation is a term used in economics to describe a situation where inflation is high, economic growth rate slows down, and unemployment remains high.
Iran's president Hassan Rouhani, while presenting the next year's budget bill at the parliament on Dec. 8, said that the administration's main concerns are to create jobs, curb the inflation, and boost economic growth.
Iran's next calendar year starts on March 21, 2014.
Mazroui who was a member of Budget Commission of parliament from 2000 to 2004, forecasts that the next year's budget's figures can be materialized.
Iranian next year's budget is contractionary, Mazroui said, adding that if the parliament approves the budget, its predicted figures such as economic growth of 3 percent and inflation rate under 25 percent would be realized by the end of next Iranian calendar year (March 21, 2015).
Iran's consumer price inflation will hit 42.3 percent in the current fiscal year (started on March 21), according to the November 12 International Monetary Fund's (IMF) Regional Economic Outlook covering the Middle East and Central Asia. The report predicted that the figure will be 29 percent in the next fiscal year.
Iran's next year budget bill has set the ceiling budget at 7830 trillion rials (about $315 billion based on official exchange rate of 24,850 rials per USD).
The figure shows a 8.4 percent growth year on year.
Some 1950 trillion rials (about $78 billion) have been earmarked in the bill for the Iranian government to spend.
The bill also has set oil price at $100 per barrel and the USD exchange rate at 26,000 rials.
