The government hiked its borrowings from both local and foreign creditors by over 23 percent in the first four months of the year as the budget deficit widened due to weak revenues and accelerated spending.

Data from the Bureau of Treasury showed the government borrowed P246.39 billion in January to April this year, up 23 percent or P46.55 billion from the P199.84 it borrowed in the same months last year.

It availed of P100.74 billion in foreign loans, 155 percent higher than the P39.44 billion last year, with the increase mainly due to the sale of $1.5 billion global bonds in January.

As the government raised its budget deficit ceiling to P199.2 billion or 2.5 percent of gross domestic product (GDP), it also sourced more official development assistance from multilateral lenders including the World Bank, Asian Development Bank, Japan Bank for International Cooperation, and others.

Program loans, bulk of which went to food crisis and judicial reform measures, grew 53 percent in the first four months from P13.93 billion to P21.31 billion.

Some P8.03 billion worth of project loans were also disbursed during the period, a 54 percent increase from last year's P5.23 billion.

Meanwhile, the government tapped less funds from domestic creditors, with its total local borrowings in January to April down 9 percent from P160.4 billion to P145.65 billion.

The government issued P144.5 billion in five- and seven-year benchmark bonds as it retired P136.6 billion worth of existing bonds to boost liquidity during the period.

It also paid P198.03 billion worth of foreign-currency obligations as well as treasury bills and bonds, P10.3 billion more than the P187.71 billion it paid last year.

In all, the government borrowed P12.02 billion in the first four months of the year to finance the budget deficit.

The Philippines' P199.2 billion deficit target for this year is about P22 billion higher than the earlier revised budget gap ceiling of P177.2 billion or 2.2 percent of GDP.

The Philippines has decided to tweak its borrowing program by increasing the amount of money to be sourced from foreign creditors by P27.5 billion and reducing the amount to be sourced from domestic creditors by P3 billion. The government's credit mix is now at 72:28, in favor of domestic borrowings.

It intends to borrow P613.9 billion from both foreign and domestic creditors or P24.5 billion higher than the revised program of P589.4 billion.