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Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley (centre) listens to a point being made during yesterday’s Emergency Social Partnership Meeting at the Hilton Hotel, alongside Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, Senator Jerome Walcott (left); NUPW President, Akanni McDowall (second from left); and Minister of Health and Wellness, Lt. Col. Jeffrey Bostic.
WHILE COVID-19 may not reach our shores, the consequences of the epidemic will, and it is against this backdrop that the Government will continue to ensure that there will be a significant amount of projects in order to keep economic activity in Barbados alive.
Speaking to the media at yesterday’s press conference following the Social Partnership Meeting, Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley revealed that the current foreign reserves stood at $1,445,000,000 and was proud to say that we were successful in ensuring that we were able to meet the surpluses deadlines, and added that at this rate, by 2032, it was her hope to get the debt to 60 per cent to GDP, as it currently stands at 119 per cent, from 177 per cent.
However, the introduction of COVID-19 has brought with it a hiccup in the development of the island.
“We can however keep paying down our debt. To put it simply, I can lose weight at six pounds a week, I can lose weight at four pounds a week or I can lose weight at three pounds a week, but when I’m done, I’m still losing weight, so whether we run a six per cent primary surplus or four per cent primary surplus or a three per cent fiscal primary surplus, we are still paying down our debt,” she said.
However, she believed that what was needed now was a little “elbow room” to ensure that households are not falling through the cracks, that businesses were not failing and the life of our people could be sustained and protected while the world searched for a vaccination for COVID-19.
“Over the course of the last five/six hours with respect to Barbados’ preparedness for the COVID-19 epidemic that is affecting our region. As fate would have it, news came during our meeting about the confirmation of the first case within CARICOM and that is mostly regrettable, but the reality is that it is likely that most countries across the world will be impacted by this new form of the coronavirus,” she said.
“There is a danger that even if we do not get even a single case of COVID-19, which is highly unlikely, that the consequences of this viral infection will lead to significant suffering among the world’s population. It is already affecting the supply chains of the world, which will impact on the movement of not just food and pharmaceuticals, but other key pieces of equipment and spare parts; it is already impacting travel.
“In all things we will not panic, we will follow the science.”
