Shanghai Daily news

The Shanghai government will spend more on public health and agriculture in its 2004 budget, a senior government official said yesterday.

Though its overall budget expenditure will rise 15.4 percent, the government is hopeful that it will break even as its revenue is also expected to climb significantly.

The city's 2004 fiscal revenue from January to December is forecast to grow 13.8 percent to 102.33 billion yuan (US$12.36 billion), Liu Hongwei, director of Shanghai Finance Bureau, said yesterday at the on-going annual session of the Shanghai People's Congress.

Shanghai's economy, which is expected to expand by more than 10 percent this year, will support the rise in fiscal income, she added.

Combined with other income from the central government and last year's 100 million yuan surplus, the government will have enough to cover its 127.22 billion yuan expenditure this year, Liu noted.

The government will spend 1.5 billion yuan, or 12 percent more than last year, to build up its public health facilities. Its budget for agriculture and forestry projects will be 830 million yuan, 10.4 percent higher than the year-ago level.

Its spending in education will also rise 10.1 percent to 4.18 billion yuan.

Infrastructure investment, the largest item in the government's budget, will total 11.4 billion yuan - almost unchanged from last year.

The city is expected to receive 9.4 percent less, or 7.25 billion yuan, in value-added tax, Liu said, without elaborating.