Maputo, Mozambique, 21 March – Mozambique’s Finance minister said Friday in Maputo that the government planned to maintain its austerity measures in order to manage the savings needed to continue to subsidise some essential products.

Manuel Chang, noting that it was essential to revise the State Budget to create more room to protect the more vulnerable echelons of the Mozambican population, by reducing imbalances in distribution of national income, noted that the government would keep the measures to reduce public spending in place alongside others that aimed to increase revenues.

“To that end, the tax authorities are being called on to develop and perfect their role in the fair distribution of income, finding ways of taxing superfluous products to cover the expenses that will benefit the neediest parts of the population.”

The Finance minister did not mention revision of the contracts of so-called mega projects, but announced that he had instructed the Tributary Authority to analyse the taxation of mining of natural resources so that this sector may contribute, “in a significant way” to funding the State budget. (macauhub)