September 16 (SeeNews) - Bulgaria's finance minister Vladislav Goranov has said that budget deficit could fall below 1% of Gross Domestic Product (GDP) this year, which could help the government accumulate more funds to repay debt in 2017, local media reported on Friday.
The finance ministry said last month that it expected this year's budget deficit to come in lower than the projected level of 2% of GDP on the back of improved tax collection, which has strongly boosted revenue, and a lack of serious pressure on the expenditure side.
No changes to the approved budget expenditure for 2016 will be made, Goranov told parliament, according to media outlet Investor.bg.
Bulgaria's consolidated budget surplus is expected to reach 3.29 billion levs ($1.9 billion/1.7 billion euro) for the first eight months of the year, or 3.7% of the government's 2016 GDP forecast, the finance ministry said last month citing preliminary data.
(1 euro = 1.95583 levs)