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No further austerity needed for Portugal's stability program: PM

Xinhua, April 22, 2016 Adjust font size:

Portuguese Prime Minister Antonio Costa said on Friday that targets in the country's growth and stability program would be met through a "calm process of budgetary consolidation" and no further austerity measures would be needed.

"We are going to focus on implementing this budget. The implementation is thankfully going well and nothing indicates that new measures will be needed," he said, following a meeting with Portuguese President Marcelo Rebelo de Sousa in Evora, some 140 km southeast of Portuguese capital Lisbon.

The prime minister's comments came after the country's long-term budget plan was approved at a cabinet meeting on Thursday.

The country's objective is to reach deficit of 1.4 percent of GDP in 2017, down from 2.2 percent expected for this year and 4.4 percent last year. The government also expects the economy to grow 1.8 percent this year and next year.

A reluctant Portugal has been under pressure by the European Union to implement further measures to meet its budget targets. Portugal ended up agreeing to additional measures such as additional taxes on alcohol and tobacco, to avoid non-compliance.

On Thursday, Eurostat said Portugal had missed its deficit target last year of 2.7 percent and was above the European Union (EU) ceiling of 3 percent.

Portugal was bailed out in 2011 under a 78 billion euros (87.79 billion U.S. dollars) package by the European Central bank, International Monetary Fund and European Commission and the country exited the bailout program after three years of reforms.

The Socialist government, which came to power in November last year, has reversed the austerity policy but promised to meet EU's requirement on deficit targets. Enditem