IMF happy with progress

The Barbados Economic Recovery and Transformation (BERT) programme is on track.

That is the word from Minister in the Ministry of Finance Ryan Straughn, who has revealed that officials from the International Monetary Fund (IMF) are pleased with the country’s performance.

An IMF team arrived on the island last week to receive an update on the programme which was introduced last June by Prime Minister Mia Mottley.

Speaking at a Barbados Labour Party (BLP) constituency meeting at St Christopher Primary on Sunday evening, Straughn said, “We have already had the second disbursement with respect to the funds from the IMF. We have worked really, really hard to make sure that we can give you the citizens the confidence that this plan is working.

“Now some persons would have been laid off and that is unfortunate, but we are working to make sure that the opportunities that we said we were going to provide, that we will actually provide,” he added.

Straughn said Government would continue to keep citizens abreast of what was going on throughout the duration of the four-year programme.

“The critical thing that I want to emphasize is that as we move through this, the confidence that you as citizens will have and surely businesses and investors will be critical in creating the conditions for better and greater and even more inclusive growth for the economy.

“Unlike the seven, eight, nine, ten plans that the previous government had, what
you will hear quarter after quarter, after quarter as we go through what we say we are going to do, we are communicating to you what is being done, who will be affected and how we plan to mitigate against it,” Straughn said.

“As those things happen, the report of the IMF represents that objective assessment of the success of the programme.”