AMMAN —
The balance owed by Jordan during the first half of this year increased by 1.6
percent, to JD29.16 billion, compared to JD28.7 billion at the end of 2021,
according to local media outlets.
اضافة اعلان
Statistics
published on the website of the
Ministry of Finance on Sunday showed that
Jordan’s internal debt at the end of the first half of 2022 amounted to JD13.89
billion, and external debt amounted to JD15.26 billion. According to the data,
the total public debt increased by JD757 million in the first half of 2022
compared to the end of 2021.
But discrepancies
remain over the Dept to GDP ratio, which Al-Mamlaka TV said it had now
increased to 107.6 percent in the first half of 2022. According to other
outlets, however, the percentage now stands at 88.4 percent of the Kingdom’s
GDP.
The Ministry of
Finance announced early last year that it had changed its method for calculating
public debt in agreement with the International Monetary Fund, so that its
debts would be excluded from the
Social Security Investment Fund, which
amounted to nearly JD7 billion.
The government has
adopted the concept of general government debt, which considers the debt from
the Social Security Investment Fund, municipalities and independent bodies as
debt from government institutions.
Meanwhile, the
consumer price index (CPI), an inflation indicator, increased by 5.36 percent
during August compared to the same period last year, according to the
Department of Statistics, Al-Mamlaka TV reported.
According to the
report, what mainly contributed to this increase was “the fuel and electricity
by 31.59 percent, transportation by 6.89 percent, rents by 4.48 percent,
culture and entertainment by 14.2 percent, and health by 6.97 percent.”
At a cumulative
level, the average CPI for the first eight months of this year was 106.07,
compared to 102.14 for the same period in 2021, registering a 3.85 percent
increase, the report said.
Among the most prominent commodity groups that contributed
to this rise are “fuel and electricity by 20.97 percent, transportation by 5.80
percent, vegetables and dry and canned legumes by 10.15 percent, rents by 1.59
percent, and culture and entertainment by 8.14 percent”, according to the
report.
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