Lowering of Policy Rate Will Foster Greater Access to Capital – Dr. Clarke

Minister of Finance and the Public Service, Dr. the Hon. Nigel Clarke, says with the lowering of the Bank of Jamaica’s (BOJ) policy interest rate, more businesses can now access well-needed capital at affordable rates.

Speaking at the opening ceremony for the Caribbean Leadership Project (CLP), at The Jamaica Pegasus hotel in New Kingston on June 28, Dr. Clarke informed that the BOJ has lowered its policy interest rate eight times since October 2016 from “five per cent in eight moves downwards to two per cent” as at June 27.

To this end, Dr. Clarke urged business operators to familiarise themselves with the opportunities available to them and the various lending rates.

“As a result of that, banks have the incentive to lend to businesses at lower and lower rates, so medium-sized and small businesses need to demand from their financial institutions that they benefit from these reductions in interest rates,” he stated.

He added that business owners should “put themselves in a position to shop their businesses around to alternative institutions, if their financial institutions refuse to lower their interest rates”.

The two-day symposium is being held under the theme ‘Building Leadership Resilience: From Surviving to Thriving’.

The Caribbean Leadership Project is an initiative funded by the Government of Canada to support the leadership and economic development training needs of national public sectors in 12 CARICOM countries and key regional organisations.

The countries participating in the project are Antigua and Barbuda, Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, St. Lucia, St. Kitts and Nevis, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, and Trinidad and Tobago.

The purpose of the CLP is to strengthen the capacity of future leaders in the Caribbean to contribute more effectively to regional integration and economic growth and support gender-sensitive public-sector reform.

The six components of the CLP are leadership development programme; enabling environment; research; continuous learning and development network; communities of practice; and the Caribbean Centre for Leadership Excellence.