Vision 2030 Must be Inclusive – Hughes

Financial Secretary, Ministry of Finance and Planning, Dr. Wesley Hughes, has underscored the need for inclusiveness in the implementation of the National Development Plan, Vision 2030 Jamaica, to ensure the country’s timely and sustainable progression towards developed country status within 18 years.

He warns that failure to include all stakeholders, whom the plan will impact, could derail the efforts towards making Jamaica the place of choice to live, work, raise families and do business.

“It is for us to ensure that the (manner in which the) plan is implemented (is) inclusive, because if we are leaving sections of the community behind…, (then) we (will) not (be able to build) a sustainable environment,” Dr. Hughes said on April 11 at the two-day Vision 2030 Country Assessment and National Prioritization Workshop, at the Knutsford Court Hotel, New Kingston.

He stated that history has proved that the exclusion of any group, however small or seemingly unimportant, has the capacity to disrupt the entire system. “So, it is in our best interest to include all groups; regardless of what we may think of the group…and treat them with respect, with dignity, and include them in all aspects of our planning,” he stressed.

Director General of the Planning Institute of Jamaica’s (PIOJ), Dr. Gladstone Hutchinson, in a message delivered by Director for Sustainable Development and Regional Planning, Claire Bernard, contended that the goals of Vision 2030 could not be achieved unless there was cognizance of existing local and global conditions and developments, “and if we fail to recalibrate and re-prioritize”.

Over 100 stakeholders from the public and private sectors, civil society, academia and the international development community are participating in the two-day workshop, organised and hosted by the PIOJ in collaboration with the Ministry of Finance and Planning, and the Office of the Cabinet.

The workshop, being held under the theme: ‘Towards the Preparation of the New Medium Term Socio-Economic Policy Framework (MTF) 2012-2015,’ forms part of the process by the PIOJ to prepare the Plan’s second Medium Term Socio-Economic Policy Framework (MTF), for the 2012 to 2015 period. The initial MTF, which commenced in 2009, ended in March.

The MTF is the main mechanism for translating Vision 2030 Jamaica’s long-term national goals and outcomes, into action. The National Development Plan provides a comprehensive planning framework in which the economic, social, environmental and governance aspects of national development are integrated. The Plan is expected to position Jamaica to achieve developed country status by 2030, thereby making it the place of choice to live, work, raise families, and do business.

The forum concludes on Thursday (April 12).