More than 240 major national projects are set to become operational by yearend (March 21, 2015), Mohammad Bagher Nobakht, vice president for strategic planning and supervision said in a meeting held in Tehran to discuss how to get the private sector to handle hundreds of unfinished government projects. All the provincial projects visited by President Hassan Rouhani will be inaugurated by the end of the current year, he announced on Wednesday.
He also touched on the proposed budget for the upcoming year, saying that oil revenues are estimated to stand at about 710 trillion rials ($26.3 billion at official exchange rate) and the administration is planning to allocate less than one third of it to the current budget, Nobakht said. He insisted that the government seeks to increase the capital budget. Nobakht added that regarding the limited government financial resources, the priority would be given to projects with over 80% of progress.
He also said that the government welcomes the participation and cooperation of the private sector to improve domestic production and thus has allocated 6.5 quadrillion rials ($241.6 billion) in loans to the sector.
