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$14.6b, 11 ministries, 110 days to spend

(China Daily)
Updated: 2008-11-13 06:53

Eleven ministries have been allocated 100 billion yuan ($14.65 billion) from the 4-trillion-yuan economic stimulus package and have to spend the amount before early March, China Business News said on Wednesday.

"Some ministries have responded more quickly than we expected" to the State Council's stimulus package announced on Sunday, said an official of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), the country's top economic planning body.

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On Tuesday, the NDRC called an urgent meeting with ministries and local governments to decide how they would share the money.

Half the amount will go to sectors such as agriculture, forest and water resources, and the rest will be spent on housing and environmental protection, and other projects, the newspaper quoted an unnamed source as having said.

The ministries of water resources and transport have got 20 billion yuan and 10 billion yuan, the report said, but didn't specify how the rest of the 100 billion yuan was allocated.

The State Council wants the ministries, including those for agriculture, water resources, housing and urban-rural development, and health, to earmark the money for specific projects before the meeting of the National People's Congress next year, the report said.

That means they have about 110 days to do so because the meeting is scheduled for early March.

Ministries have already started working on how and where to use the money. Apart from that, they will spend more to boost economy.

The Ministry of Housing and Urban-Rural Development, for instance, said yesterday it will spend 900 billion yuan in the next three years to provide housing to 7.47 million low-income households.