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The government is given renewed impetus to the process of staunching the bleeding of billions of dollars from the public purse, achieving greater transparency, while ensuring the speedy processing of government contracts. This process is being undertaken through the promulgation and implementation of the Revised Handbook of Public Sector Procurement Procedures and Standard Bidding Documents, December 2008, during the 2009/10...

The deadline for companies, self-employed persons, and employees with alternative sources of earnings to submit their income tax returns for 2008, has been pushed to Monday, March 16. The Tax Administration Services Department (TASD) had originally set March 15 as the deadline, but this has been revised as the date falls on a Sunday. In an interview with JIS News,...

Minister without Portfolio in the Ministry of Finance and the Public Service, Senator Dwight Nelson, has said there is an urgent need to fast-track the transformation of existing structures in the public sector. "There are still too many structures in the pubic sector that are antiquated, that are old, that are not in keeping with modern needs and, as such,...

The Financial Services Commission (FSC) plans to move decisively this year to address glitches in the laws governing the Mutual Trust Fund and Unit Trust, as it seeks to stave off the havoc unleashed by the global economic meltdown. Executive Director of the FSC, Rohan Barrett, asserted today (March 9), that the global financial crisis presents an opportunity to change...

Minister of Finance and the Public Service, Audley Shaw, has said that the Government is committed to maintaining free health care for all Jamaicans at public health facilities. Mr. Shaw was speaking at a Rotary Club of Christiana dinner at the Mandeville Hotel, on Wednesday (March 4) to honour a group of American dentists who have been providing voluntary dental...

Superintendent of Police for Manchester, Ryland Salmon, has said that the close collaboration among community groups, citizens, and the police over the past three months, was yielding results, with the capture of many wrongdoers. "It is clear to us that our community-based policing is working in certain critical communities and that our work is producing results where we have recovered...

Finance and Public Service Minister, Audley Shaw, has said that the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) is looking at assisting in the expansion of an agricultural greenhouse technology pilot project in his North East Manchester constituency. Addressing the launch of the FINPYME company competitiveness programme at the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel, in Kingston on Monday (Mar. 2), Mr. Shaw said that during...

Minister of Finance and the Public Service, Audley Shaw, has urged financial lending institutions to become more receptive to the needs of the business sector. Mr. Shaw urged the institutions to return to the drawing board and rethink their position, warning that they needed to be "receptive and responsive" to stakeholders in the productive sector who are seeking assistance with...

Jamaica's earnings from the bauxite levy are not expected to yield anywhere near the projected $6 billion for the 2009/10 fiscal year, consequent on the global economic downturn, Finance and the Public Service Minister, Audley Shaw, has said. "We will be lucky if we earn half of that," Mr. Shaw told the launch of the FINPYME company competitiveness programme, at...

Implementation of the a bi-lateral air services agreement signed by Jamaica and Brazil has been put on hold, pending, among other things, the divestment of the national carrier, Air Jamaica. The agreement was inked in December 2007, by Transport and Works Minister, Michael Henry, and then Brazilian Ambassador to Jamaica, Cezar Augusto De Souza Lima. It signalled the culmination of...

President of the Graduate School of Leadership and Professional Development in Namibia, Jamaican-born Professor Earle Taylor, has attributed the current global economic crisis to a lack of leadership and management. Professor Taylor said that the unwillingness of some countries to recognise the need for, and value of effective and sound leadership on a continuous basis, or to ensure that this...

By the end of March, the National Export-Import Bank (EXIM) of Jamaica will have disbursed some $6 billion in loan funds for 2008/2009, a 25 per cent increase over the previous fiscal period. The disbursement would have met the target set by the new board of directors appointed in December, 2008 and, as Deputy Managing Director of the bank, Megan...