OREANDA-NEWS. September 14, 2012. The Cabinet of Ministers at its meeting has approved the draft law "On the State Budget for 2013". This was announced by Finance Minister Yuriy Kolobov at a briefing on the results of the meeting of the Government.

"The budget is realistic, all financial indicators optimally balanced, increasing revenues is primarily due to planned growth at 4.5%" - the Minister said.

Yuriy Kolobov said that the nominal GDP in 2013 is expected to reach 1.687 trillion UAH, the inflation forecast is planned at 5.9%, and the budget deficit - 1.65% of GDP.

"State budget revenues increases compared to the plan for the current year by 6.4% to 394.6 bln. UAH. Costs of providing loans increase by 6.3% to 434.6 bln. UAH which is up than this year by 25.6 billion UAH" - the Minister informed.

According to him, for the sake of stimulating the development of the national economy, the Government of Ukraine has chosen the policy of improving social standards in 2013 and the reduction in tax rates. Accordingly, in 2013, the minimum wage and a living wage for employed persons will increase by 8.7%.

Also, the state budget for 2013 envisages increasing subventions from the state budget to local budgets by 8.1 billion UAH to 39 billion UAH to help vulnerable citizens.

As noted Yuriy Kolobov, in 2013 and continued a program of social initiatives of the President. On the implementation of social initiatives in the field of pensions draft budget provides 29 billion UAH.

In addition, the Minister noted, the policy is continued to increase the funding of education and health sectors. In particular, the 2013 state budget provides nearly 63 billion UAH for education and 59.8 billion UAH for health care.

Also in 2013, the Government is going to provide state guarantees for a total of 16.9 billion UAH, it is 1% of GDP, to support innovation and investment projects, in particular the development of the export potential of the national economy.

"The budget for 2013 is a balanced document, it provides in full implementation of strategic, economic and social tasks necessary to stimulate economic growth and improve the welfare of the citizens", - Yuriy Kolobov concluded.