MORE DETAILS NEEDED
ECONOMIST Bernard Codrington believes the Mia Amor Mottley administration should use the remaining time in its first 100 days in office to do a more detailed analysis of the economy.
In a brief interview with The Barbados Advocate yesterday, Codrington is reasoning that after that is done, the government should then formulate a home grown economic plan that is feasible, workable, and suitable to this country’s environment, to revive the economy. He also insisted that the private sector must play its role in stimulating the economy.
The comments by Codrington come against the background of the recent departure from Barbados of a team from the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which argues that Government has to do more to correct the ills in the economy.
Today marks 54 days since the new Barbados Labour Party (BLP) administration has been in office having been elected to office on May 24.
Codrington, an Economist and a retired Senior Official at Republic Bank (Barbados) Limited, believes that the remaining time leading to the first 100 days in office should be spent assessing Barbados’ economic situation.
He said that in undertaking the assessment, the government should look to find out among other things why expenditures are not matching revenues, and to look into some of the matters raised by the Auditor General in his latest report, to get a better picture of the situation and the fundamental problems in the economy.
He also believes that the new administration has to take note of the changing external environment where protectionism continues to raise its head, countries are pushing their own buy local campaigns, foreign investors are not venturing abroad, and where Barbados still has to face up to the loss of inflows from offshore companies.
“We have to take fresh guard and with a deeper assessment of the situation, put the issues in a specific narrative,” Codrington pointed out.
He told The Barbados Advocate that the country has the human resources to do these things and that after the detailed analysis is done, “the Government has to decided where we are going”.
“They should not allow the International Monetary Fund to impose things on us since the IMF does not have the answers,” said Codrington. He is not in favour of lay-offs in the public sector either.
He pointed out that in the recovery process, there has to be a role for the private sector which must also come up with its own plan. According to him, “The private sector has to produce goods and services for sale abroad. We must stop depending on the Government since it alone cannot do everything.” (JB)