The primary surplus has progressively contracted; this year it is likely to be around 2 per cent of GDP, notably less than the value of 5.5 per cent set in order to participate in the Monetary Union and to ensure a significant rate of debt reduction in relation to GDP.
You can’t eat, drink, smoke or wear foreign exchange; foreign exchange is not a commodity. Rather, the exchange rate is what it says on the tin, a statement about the relation between one measure of value and another.