Prime Minister Ivo Sanader said the figures showed budgetary revenue was positive and that economic activities were growing, notably in the April-June period.
He said there was a trend of economic growth because figures regarding July indicated that budgetary revenue continued to grow.
Finance Minister Ivan Suker said the real effects could be seen once the August revenue came in.
The 4.8 billion kuna deficit was financed entirely on the domestic market and will continue to be financed on the domestic market until the end of the year, it was said.
Taking loans on the domestic market helped reduce the external debt to below 10 per cent of the annual growth, which is the lowest annual growth of the external debt in the last three years, said the PM.
Suker said the budgetary revenue in this year's first six months was 39.6 billion kuna, with tax revenue going up 6.2 per cent to 23.14 billion kuna.
The government also adopted economic and fiscal policy guidelines for the 2006-8 period according to which the real GDP growth rate this year will be 3.7 per cent, going up to four per cent in 2006 and 4.3 per cent in 2008.
The government estimates that the GDP per capita will grow from the current 6,200 to 8,250 euros in 2008.
Inflation is expected to remain low, while the external debt is expected to be gradually reduced from last year's 82.1 per cent of GDP to 77.7 per cent in 2008.
By 2008 the government plans to further reduce the general government deficit from this year's 4.2 per cent to 2.8 per cent of GDP.
The external debt is expected to remain below 80 per cent, Sanader said. In 2006 the debt is expected to amount to EUR25.5 billion and in 2008 to EUR28.7 billion, which would be 77.7 per cent of GDP.
Sanader said budgetary investments would be around seven per cent of GDP, adding that Croatia was among the countries with the highest such rate among European Union member and candidate countries.
Sanader also said that the health sector, the pension system, science and judicial reform remained government priorities.
(EUR1 = 7.3 kuna)