On June 20, 2014, the Executive Board of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) concluded the Article IV consultation and fourth review through the Extended Arrangement under the Extended Fund Facility (EFF) with Jamaica. The completion of the review enables the disbursement of an amount equivalent to SDR 45.95 million (about US$70.9 million) bringing the total disbursements under the arrangement to SDR...

There is an urgent need for parents to begin playing a greater role in the lives of their children, especially during their primary and high school years, states Minister of Education, Hon. Rev. Ronald Thwaites. He called on administrators of schools across the island to move decisively to establish a written contract between parents and the institutions, for both parties...

Female entrepreneurs have long experienced challenges which have been impediments to their business engagements. Some of these hurdles include: limited access to formal business networks and financing. Consequent on these developments, particularly across the region, the Women Entrepreneurs Network of the Caribbean (WENC) has been established to address existing and emerging concerns. Launched in March 2012, the WENC evolved from...

Prime Minister, the Most Hon Portia Simpson Miller, has lauded her alma mater, Union Institute and University, in the United States, for being transformational in its provision of tertiary education. Mrs. Simpson Miller, who holds a degree in Public Administration from the institution, says she and other alumni have all been beneficiaries of Union Institute’s “long term vision” for tertiary...

The curriculum at Sydney Pagon Agricultural High School in St. Elizabeth is being revised to incorporate the delivery of Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics (STEM) programmes. The transition at the parish’s sole agricultural high school to a more STEM-oriented focus, the first such undertaking at the secondary level, is slated to take effect at the start of the 2014/15 academic...

As part of the government’s coordinated effort to enhance emergency planning and strengthen the nation’s overall level of preparedness, the National Emergency Response Geographic Information Systems Team (NERGIST) was officially launched on June 19 at the Mona Visitors’ Lodge & Conference Centre at the University of the West Indies, Mona with a graduation exercise for 15 of its volunteers. NERGIST...

The Government will be spending $120 million to transform the facility in Montpelier, St. James, where Haitian refugees were housed, into a second campus for Anchovy High School. Education Minister, Rev. Hon. Ronald Thwaites in addressing a ceremony at the Montpelier site where the announcement was made on Friday, June 20, said the upgrading work is to be completed in...