Ukrainian govt endorses 2025 state budget draft for 2nd reading

MOSCOW. Nov 11 (Interfax) - The Ukrainian government has adopted the 2025 draft state budget for the second reading, Ukrainian media quoted Prime Minister Denis Shmygal as saying.

The priority is given to military spending, he was quoted as saying on social media. "For these needs, we propose allocating 2.225 trillion hryvni," Shmygal said.

The social sector, education and healthcare remain among the budget priorities, Shmygal said.

The government also increased the state budget expenditures by 50 billion hryvni for the second meeting, he said.

In particular, an additional 24 billion hryvni is proposed to allocate to education, of which 12 billion hryvni will be spent on additional payments to teachers and another 12 billion hryvni on investment projects in the educational sector.

The government also proposed allocating an additional 6.3 billion hryvni to healthcare and another 5 billion hryvni in support of veterans.

The road fund will not be funded in 2025, but 12.6 billion hryvni is proposed to allocate for the repair of areas critical for the defense sector and operations of the domestic economy, Shmygal said.

In particular, it is envisioned to remain the eRecovery compensation program in effect and fund it in full.

As reported, the revenues of the general fund (without grants and inter-budgetary transfers) were projected at 2.7 trillion hryvni in the 2025 government's draft state budget for the first reading, which is 411 billion hryvni more than in 2024, while expenditures at 3.644 trillion hryvni, which is 535 billion hryvni more than in 2024, including the total resource for national security and defense was projected at 2.223 trillion hryvni (around 26% of GDP), which is 46 billion hryvni more than the 2024 target.