Türkiye's central government budget recorded a surplus in the first six months of 2006, the first such result in 22 years, according to a Finance Ministry report released Tuesday.
By the end of June, Türkiye had achieved 78.4 percent of its annual non-interest surplus target of 32.2 billion Turkish lira (YTL). Central government revenues climbed 22.8 percent to 84 billion YTL, with tax receipts accounting for nearly 79 percent of that total.
On the spending side, outlays rose 14.8 percent over the January-June period, while interest expenses increased 23.2 percent. Transfers to social security institutions grew 12.9 percent to 12.93 billion YTL, and the agricultural sector received 2.5 billion YTL in financial support. General public services represented the largest share of budget expenditures.
The projected year-end budget deficit has been revised down sharply, to 9.2 billion YTL from an earlier estimate of 13.9 billion YTL. Domestic borrowing stock rose to 249.1 billion YTL in the first half of 2006, up from 244.8 billion YTL in the same period of 2005, while total foreign borrowing stock reached 68.9 billion USD.
Historical summary. TurkishPress restated this wire report, first published in August 2006, in its own words.