YEREVAN, NOVEMBER 3, NOYAN TAPAN. By the 2007 draft state budget, the expenditures on maintenance of the state governance machinery will make 40.5 bln drams, which exceeds the 2006 financing by 5.2 bln drams (about 13.7 mln USD). Presenting the issue of the draft state budget-envisaged financing of the state governance machinery at the November 3 joint sitting of the RA National Assembly standing committees, RA Deputy Minister of Finance and Economy Pavel Safarian said that 67% of the increase of financing is conditioned by the planned growth in salaries of civil servants and the related increase in allocations for social secirity payments. Particularly, from January 1, 2007 it is envisaged to set the basic official salary of civil servants at 35,500 drams instead of 30,000 drams in 2006. The total cost of this change is 1.2 bln drams. As a result, in 2007 the average salary of civil servants will make 104,000 drams instead of the current 87,000 drams. From July 1, 2007 it is planned to increase the salaries of high-ranking officials by about 40%, for which the draft state budget envisages additional financing of 676 mln drams. One of the peculiarities of the law on official salaries of high-ranking officials to be adopted soon is that their salaries will be set not in absolute figures but in comparison with the minimal salary in Armenia. Salaries of other categories of employees of the state governance machinery will increase by 20%, which requires additional financing of 508 mln drams. According to P. Safarian, the growth in the salary fund of the state governance machinery is also conditioned by some structural changes, including the creation of the Judicial Department and a growth in the number of employees due to the increased functions of some state governance bodies. As a result, in 2007 the number of jobs in the state governance machinery will increase by 174 and make 15,329.5. The deputy minister said that along with these financing changes, the share of expenditures on the state governance machinery in the overall budgetary expenditures will remain the same compared with 2006 - 7.3%, while their ratio to GDP will decline - from 1.47% in 2006 to 1.37%.

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