In an optimistic scenario, Ecuador would produce 980,700 barrels per day in 2025, says Minister Cueva

The Government maintains that If its National Development Plan is applied, the country’s economy will grow by 2.8% in 2022 and by 2025 it would reach a 5% growth. It also considers that oil production, which in 2022 will be 502,900 barrels per day, would reach 980,700 barrels per day in three more years. This would only be achieved by applying a series of active policies that the Government has planned for the future.

Instead, under the current scenario, when the reforms that the Government seeks to carry out have not yet been approved (including the tax law), the four-year goals of budget programming are much more conservative. Thus, while the goals of the 2022 is 2.8% in growth and 502,900 barrels for production, in the current schedule the growth for 2025 would only reach 2.70% and oil production barely reaches 540,000 barrels per day in 2025.

For this reason, the Government decided to incorporate the two scenarios into the budget programming: one conservative and the other optimistic for the economic development of the country. The first portrays the current reality, from which it starts. This was explained this November 9 by the Minister of Economy and Finance, Simón Cueva, within the Economic Regime Commission.

In recent days, several analysts had criticized that the goals of the annual plan did not correspond to what the schedule indicated. However, Minister Cueva explained that this is because the projections cannot be included in the proforma.

The minister came to explain the details of the 2022 proforma and responded to the assembly members about a series of doubts regarding the resources allocated to universities, to the GAD, as well as compliance with the 0.5% increase in gross domestic product (GDP) for Education and Health.

One of the recurring doubts was what is the reason for having compared the resources allocated in the proforma 2022 with the codified budget as of August 2021. On this issue, it was clarified that the August codification is a projection of the annual budget and not as some assembly members thought that it was executed until August and that this did not allow to reflect an adequate comparison of the increase in income for 2022.

In any case, it was also clear that the 2022 proforma should have been compared with the one codified as of August, because the Assembly had not concluded the approval process for the 2021 proforma, when the Executive had to deliver the proforma.

However, also It was announced that at the moment the proforma 2021 that was sent by the Executive is in force and that it was not approved by the Assembly. This, after a resolution of the State Attorney General’s Office.

Prosecutor Íñigo Salvador spoke before a query made by President Guillermo Lasso, regarding whether or not the Assembly could establish the validity of an extended budget. This, after the Legislative, by a motion of the president of the Economic Regime Commission, Mireya Pazmiño (PK), did not approve said proforma, arguing that the Executive had delivered an answer to the observations raised in the first instance at the wrong time.

This left the Government in uncertainty for several weeks, as it was not known what the budget to be executed for the rest of the year was going to be. On the subject, the attorney made the necessary consultations, including the president of the Assembly, Guadalupe Llori, who had responded that the Assembly at no time established the validity of the extended budget.

Consequently, Salvador indicated that “in view of the terms of his inquiry, it is concluded that, once the approval procedure of the General State Budget has begun in accordance with article 103 of the Organic Law of the Legislative Function, it must conclude subject to said norm, without the exception established by its article 107 being extended to cases not expressly provided for by it or by another norm of equal or superior rank ”. Thus, the Presidency ordered the publication of the document in the Official Registry on November 5.

Meanwhile, the Commission is preparing to prepare the non-binding report that must be known to the plenary in the following days. Pazmiño summoned the advisers of the assembly members to begin this preparation tomorrow. It is also expected to receive some delegates from certain entities, such as the House of Culture and the prison regime, to express their concerns regarding the budget. (I)