Economic Programme Oversight Committee (EPOC) Co-Chairman, Keith Duncan, says robust tax revenue growth over the last two years is creating the welcome fiscal space that allows for notable increases in Government capital expenditure and social spending. These increases, he said, are reflected in the first 2018/19 Supplementary Estimates, tabled in the House of Representatives on September 25 by Finance and...

Economic Programme Oversight Committee (EPOC) Co-Chairman, Keith Duncan, anticipates that the International Monetary Fund’s (IMF) Executive Board will ratify Jamaica’s fourth review under the IMF’s Precautionary Standby Arrangement (PSBA), when its members meet for deliberations on November 5. Mr. Duncan said this optimism is based on the economic programme’s out-turns through to the end of June 2018, which saw the...

Minister of Industry, Commerce, Agriculture and Fisheries, Hon. Audley Shaw, is appealing for microfinance institutions to lower interest rates on loans for small business owners. “I encourage microlenders to ensure that your (loan) products are not exploitative with high interest rates that, instead of lifting our entrepreneurs, push them into a situation of unproductivity and perpetual borrowing,” he said. The...

Human resources shared services in the public sector is expected to be operational by the end of the current financial year. This was stated in a message from Minister without Portfolio in the Ministry of Finance and the Public Service, Hon. Fayval Williams, at a human resources transformation seminar held on October 10 at The Knutsford Court Hotel in New...

Youngsters residing at Sophie’s Place of Safety and St. Anthony’s Children’s Home in St. Andrew are to benefit from the proceeds of the inaugural charity walk/run being staged for Civil Service Week (CSW) 2018. The 5K event will take place on Saturday (November 17) and participants will start and finish at Emancipation Park. Senior Director Employee Relations and Benefits Unit,...

Prime Minister, the Most Hon. Andrew Holness, says consideration is being given for Jamaica to participate in the first cohort of countries to be measured in the World Bank Group’s Human Capital Index. Speaking at a conference of local Executive Management, Heads of Mission and Consular posts, at The Jamaica Pegasus hotel in New Kingston on October 9, he emphasised...

Finance and the Public Service Minister, Dr. the Hon. Nigel Clarke, says the proposed Microcredit Act will be tabled in the Houses of Parliament in the next financial year, 2019/20. “Certainly, I am hoping for the first half of the next financial year that the Microcredit Act will be tabled and debated,” he said. Dr. Clarke was speaking at the...