Mapping the money

At the end of March, Lebanon passed the 2018 state budget, the second budget passed in a six-month period after almost 12 years wihout any budget at all. The 2018 state budget features a 0.06 percent decrease in total spending compared against the 2017 state budget, with current expenditures declining 4 percent and capital expenditures reduced by 12.6 percent. For fiscal year 2018, the state’s total spending allocations declined about $9 million from 2017’s budget to around $15.8 billion (LL23.9 trillion). In 2018 almost 46 percent of public spending—$7.3 billion (LL11 trillion)—will go toward common expenses, such as paying for interest on public debt, salaries and pension payments, and to subsidize the failing electricity utility Electricité du Liban (although the government claims this subsidy was not written into the 2018 budget). The budget’s common expenses declined about 4 percent when compared to 2017 allocations. The Ministry of National Defense, responsible