Minister of Education, Technological and Vocational Training, Santia Bradshaw (centre), as she spoke with Phillipa Challis (left) of the Sandy Lane Charitable Trust and Kemar Saffrey, President of the Barbados Alliance to End Homelessness and coordinator of the National NGO Impact Consultation, which was held at the Hilton Hotel yesterday.
A section of the NGO community gathered for the National NGO Impact Consultation.
NGOs or Non-Governmental Organi-sations have been recognised for the role they have played to date in helping to maintain the fabric of society and assisting in keeping the country afloat, during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The sentiments came from Minister of Education, Technological and Vocational Training, Santia Bradshaw, as she delivered remarks yesterday during the National NGO Impact Consultation held at the Hilton Hotel under the theme, “The Impact of NGOs During COVID-19 and Beyond”.
The consultation sought to address a number of concerns faced by the NGO community, given that the pandemic has affected the way in which they now carry out their day to day operations and Bradshaw acknowledged that government sees the valuable role NGOs play in filling various niche areas and voids which government has not been able to fill and is therefore willing to work with the NGOs, on a wider scale.
“All of you, whether in small ways or big ways, have helped and I want to keep reemphasizing the importance of how you have kept the fabric of the society together, because the Government alone cannot do everything. I think if we could, we would, but in many cases we are working with a lot of limited resources and we are having to prioritise those resources every single day, depending on what is happening to us both locally, regionally and internationally,” Minister Bradshaw commented.
Bradshaw noted that with unemployment figures skyrocketing on account of the pandemic, a number of NGOs, which have also been affected by COVID-19, have nevertheless done their part to assist persons in need.
“We’ve watched over the past few months as several NGOs have joined the fight against the COVID-19 pandemic and government has had to adjust its expenditure in order to deal with the fact that we’ve seen the largest number of unemployment claims before the National Insurance Scheme, that has even been seen since the NIS has been established in this country,” Bradshaw remarked.
“I remember a few months ago it was around 40,000 and I remember feeling alarmed at the fact that there were 40,000 people who were identified at the time as being unemployed, but within just a matter of weeks, to then be told that the figures had now moved to 75,000 and really these are persons who are formally heading to the National Insurance who have been recently laid off, we have to recognise that there are still a number of people who have not been captured in that amount, who are also not working at this point in time,” she stressed.
“And therefore, this is an unprecedented time for government, it is an unprecedented time for all of you as NGOs, because I am sure the burden that is being placed on you to deliver services and to be able to assist in terms of human resources, is particularly challenging, just as it is for government,” the Minister said.
As such, she noted the need for those in the NGO community to find creative and innovative ways to become more sustainable and to explore new ways of funding their organisations, whilst also acknowledging government’s part in bringing about legislation soon to assist those in the third sector, in doing what they do best.