The country’s business environment will be further strengthened, with the support of $40 million, which has been set aside in the 2014/15 budget, to enable large scale investments and capacity support for the Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs) sector. The Jamaica Foundations for Competiveness and Growth project, being implemented by the Planning Institute of Jamaica (PIOJ), is geared at...

Persons most at risk for contracting HIV are being targeted under a United States Agency for International Development (USAID)-funded programme. As outlined in the 2014/15 Estimates of Expenditure, now before the House of Representatives, the HIV Prevalence in Most-at-Risk Population Reduced programme, which runs from October, 2009 to September, 2014, will this financial year receive $294.1 million. The objectives of...

An allocation of $177 million has been made in this year’s budget to complete the University of Technology’s (UTech) School of Hospitality and Tourism Management (SHTM). Now 85 per cent complete, work on the facility is among the various infrastructural improvements taking place at the university as part of the UTech Enhancement Project. Being funded by the Caribbean Development Bank...

As the country strives to achieve the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) relating to the reduction of maternal and child mortality, a total of $102.9 million has been allotted to support this undertaking in the 2014/15 Estimates of Expenditure. This will be carried out under the Reduction of Maternal and Child Mortality (PROMAC) in Jamaica programme, which began in April, 2013...

The Government is to spend $494 million on its Rural Road Rehabilitation Project II for the 2014/2015 fiscal year. This is contained in the Estimates of Expenditure, which is now before the Standing Finance Committee of the House. The money will go towards rehabilitating 22.6 kilometres (km) of road structure in areas, such as Sour Sop Turn to Danks in Clarendon...

Government has allocated $64.9 million towards enhancing the resilience of the country’s agricultural sector and coastal areas. This is set out in the 2014/15 Estimates of Expenditure, currently before the House of Representatives. The project, which is being financed through the Adaptation Fund and the Government, is being implemented by the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries. Its goal is to...

A sum of $82.8 million has been allocated in the 2014/15 Estimates of Expenditure to assist with the relocation process of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade moving to downtown Kingston. Relocation of the Ministry is to contribute to the redevelopment of the downtown area, and to exclude the Government from the high cost of office rental in...

Just over $1 billion has been earmarked in the 2014/15 Estimates of Expenditure to continue implementation of the Government’s Fiscal Administration Modernization Programme. The five-year Inter-American Development Bank (IDB)-funded project, which commenced in December 2011, aims to support the administration’s focus on attaining sustainable fiscal consolidation. This will be done by strengthening the institutional capacity of the implementing agency, the...