November 23 (SeeNews) - Romania's government revised slightly upwards its 2018 budget deficit forecast as it lifted its estimate for the country's gross domestic product, the finance ministry said on Friday.
The government expects the budget deficit to be equivalent to 2.97% of Romania's 2018 gross domestic product (GDP), the finance ministry said in a statement.
In the previous estimation, the deficit was set to 2.96% of GDP.
The estimated value of 2018 GDP was increased to 949.6 billion lei ($232 billion/204 billion euro) from 907.9 billion lei previously.
Under the revision, the ministries of finance, labour, interior, development, justice and health received additional allocations, while the ministries of transport, research, education, culture, and EU funds had their allocations reduced.
This is the second budget revision this year.
Earlier this month, the European Commission urged Romania to reduce its structural deficit by at least 1% of GDP in 2019.
The Commission has adopted a revised recommendation for Romania to correct its significant deviation from the adjustment path towards the medium-term budgetary objective because the country took no effective action in response to prior similar recommendations, the EU's executive body said in its 2018 country-specific recommendations, part of the European Semester Autumn Package.
In June 2018, the Council issued a recommendation to Romania to make an annual structural adjustment of 0.8% of GDP in both 2018 and 2019.
Romania's consolidated budget deficit widened to 1.77% of the projected 2018 GDP in the first nine months, up from 0.81% of GDP in the like period of 2017, finance ministry data showed.
Romania's consolidated budget deficit increased to 2.88% of GDP in 2017, from 2.41% a year earlier.
(1 euro=4.6584 euro)