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<span style="font-weight: bold"><span style="font-size: 14pt">Golding says economic measures bearing fruit</span></span>
WASHINGTON, DC, United States (CMC) — Jamaica's Prime Minister Bruce Golding says the economic measures that his administration has put in place are now bearing fruit and that Jamaica is now on sound economic footing.
Delivering a lecture at the prestigious Brookings Institute in Washington DC yesterday, Golding said that while the country was experiencing economic growth in some areas, there is still need for more to be done.
He said that some of the economic measures included the introduction of debt exchange, measures to reduce crime, divesting Air Jamaica and the island's sugar factories, along with the development of stringent economic programmes with support from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and the World Bank.
Golding said that his administration had also instituted significant institutional reforms to create fiscal sustainability through legislation that will put serious restrictions on our deficit and accumulation of debt and move it away from just Government's decision and subject it to significant parliamentary oversight.
"I indeed want to go further and put it in the constitution and place significant limits with the provision that only in extraordinary circumstances and with the approval of Parliament can those limits be exceeded", the prime minister said.
"We have sought to consolidate Government's accounts and bring them under one Treasury Management System. This will allow us to have a clearer picture of our government accounts," he added.
The prime minister told more than 200 persons attending the lecture that last month, a major programme of tax reform had been tabled in Parliament with the measures expected to take effect from January next year.
"After one year of intense work we have completed a major restructuring of the public sector. We have also embarked on a significant programme of privatisation. We are well advanced in the divestment of the government aluminium refineries and privatising the Norman Manley International Airport along with plans to privatise the management of the Port of Kingston," he said.
Golding noted that he is trying to return the government to its essential core functions and to leave to the private sector, those things that are more suited to private sector investment and management.
"The Government is embarking on a programme of good governance, putting in place a number of critical measures because we recognise that this too is important in supporting our hopes and plans for economic development.
"We have passed constitutional amendments to establish a new charter of fundamental rights and freedom. We have established an independent commission of investigation to deal with instances of abuse by agents of the state. We have legislation to criminalise breaches of the process by how government contracts are awarded," he said.
Golding is on a four-day visit to the United States and has already held bi-lateral talks with the US Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, President of the World Bank Robert Zoellick and the IMF Deputy Managing Director Naoyuki Shinonara.
Read more: http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/Gold...2#ixzz1OhKSj11e
Read more: http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/Gold...2#ixzz1OhKN9WYy
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