Mining down 11%, Agriculture 4.5% as economy contracts Thurs

[Sir X]

NEWS

Mining down 11%, Agriculture 4.5% as economy contracts
Thursday, February 21, 2013 | 2:19 PM




KINGSTON, Jamaica - The country’s economy contracted by 0.6 per cent in the quarter ended December 2012, the Planning Institute of Jamaica (PIOJ) has reported.
The slump resulted from a 2.7 per cent decline in the Goods Producing industry and the Services industry remaining flat.

1/1
The Goods Producing industry saw all its sectors declining. Mining and Quarrying was down 11 per cent, Agriculture dropped 4.5 per cent and Construction was down 1.5 per cent.
The announcement was made by the PIOJ’s acting director general Everton McFarlane, at the Institute’s quarterly press briefing today.
Growth for this quarter is projected between zero and one per cent.


Read more: http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/news/...#ixzz2LaIC1Mv5

[Willi]

Tell dat to Skengy and Karl.

[Sir X]

Jamaica

Lenten diet

To the IMF again

Feb 23rd 2013 |From the print edition


ON THE eve of Lent Jamaica’s prime minister, Portia Simpson Miller, placed holders of the government’s local-currency bonds on an austerity diet, asking them to accept a lower interest rate. Her finance minister followed up with unpopular emergency tax increases. In return, on February 15th the IMF announced a preliminary agreement to a $750m loan. The Lenten diet is set to continue: approval of the credit by the Fund’s board will require prior approval of more tax rises and a public-sector pay freeze.



Ms Simpson Miller has little choice. Jamaica suffers from low growth, declining productivity and a heavy debt burden (see chart). Its firms have lost competitiveness. But the island has a fraught history with the IMF, stretching back to the 1970s.
In this section

• The homecoming
• Lenten diet
• Early kick-off
• Polar-bear politics

Reprints
Related topics

• Bruce Golding
• International Monetary Fund (IMF)
• Jamaica

This month’s events were a repeat of those of three years ago, when a bond swap that lowered interest payments also marked the start of an IMF programme. Bruce Golding, Ms Simpson Miller’s predecessor, similarly agreed to reform taxes, the financial system and the public sector. After a resolute start, the programme went off track. Public-sector pay rose by more than the target. With the economy stagnant and fierce political disputes over gang crime, Mr Golding stepped down and his party then lost office in a December 2011 election.
Jamaica should do better than this. The island has plenty of well-educated, English-speaking people. It has great beaches, a near-perfect climate for farming, useful deposits of bauxite and a port which is just a short hop from both Florida and the Panama Canal.
But Jamaica lacks energy supplies. It spends more on oil imports than it earns from tourism. Households and businesses complain that electricity is dear. For a decade there has been talk of alternative fuels, such as liquefied natural gas or “clean” coal. Successive proposals have been blocked, some amid accusations of incompetence or mismanagement. Even if a scheme is approved this year, cheaper fuel remains at least five years off.
Violent crime wrecks lives, and may deter tourism. Businesses struggle with security costs. In an opinion poll in 2010, respondents ranked corruption ahead of crime and violence as “the most negative thing about Jamaica”. Greg Christie, a lawyer and former businessman, last November ended a seven-year term as contractor-general, an independent official with power to look over all government contracts. In 2011 he said that of 40 cases referred in the previous three years to the director of public prosecutions, none had been pursued in court. Only one has since been successfully prosecuted.
For the mobile, there is a quick solution. “Tax increases? I won’t be paying any of that. I’m moving to Canada,” says a young Jamaican who is about to finish his law degree. Many others have done the same.

From the print edition: The Americas

[Sir X]

Problems have been identified, what are they doing about production

1) Tourism and bauxite,slashes in social service cant pay for our fuel cost solution we need a productive export sector.

2) Corruption ranked as a problem over crime, we rank poorly on the international corruption index, the man labelled with the flimsy evidence by his adversaries and the dpp,The dpp has rejected 40 cases for prosecution.Solution we need to gives powes to all corruption investigative agencies to pursue every lead with flimsy evidence.

3) Crime , well its obvious its linked to the two above , no production/work leaves idle hands who deal in corruption that lead to crime,give people a productive job and prosecute corruption or we can continue to let the police extrajudicial kill them and let corruption continue or better yet, blame ganja,

4)Tax increase,no production will lead to high inflation, more corruption and crime, but alas we can blame it all on ganja.

4 key problems have been identified, how the imf will help,if we seriously address 2 out of these we are on the way because they are intracably linked to growth, i would start with corrution and production.

Vote dem out...Ben tell labour run wid it fi unnu next campaign , wi a fight gainst corruption and wi a deal wid production..caaan loose

[Mosiah]

For the mobile, there is a quick solution. “Tax increases? I won’t be paying any of that. I’m moving to Canada,” says a young Jamaican who is about to finish his law degree. Many others have done the same.

Hmmm...

[Willi]

See yuh bredrin yah a big dem up for signing the deal in "record time" LoL

http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/colum...gins-_13687996

[Lazie]

See yuh bredrin yah a big dem up for signing the deal in "record time" LoL

http://www.jamaicaobserver.com/colum...gins-_13687996

Again, another attempt to rewrite history.

[Muadib]

suh him ah nuh PJ fren nuh more ???

[World Fan]

2) Corruption ranked as a problem over crime...

I think that's part of the problem right there.