Published:Friday | November 6, 2015
The Economic Programme Oversight Committee (EPOC) says while it is understandable that Jamaicans are impatient to see more substantial economic growth, a little more perseverance in pursuing the right policies will see improvements in the quarters ahead.
Committee co-chairman Richard Byles, noted that all the economic indicators in Jamaica were pointing in a positive direction, which should “see more substantial growth as we go along, quarter by quarter”.
Jamaica recorded gross domestic product growth of 0.4 per cent in the April-June 2015 quarter and 0.6 per cent in the quarter to September.
“As long as we don’t have any exogenous shocks like the weather, or economic calamities in the United States or elsewhere in the world, terrorist acts, things that we can’t control, I think that we are on a path for economic growth,” he said.
Based on government data, Byles also believes Jamaica is on track to meet the most important targets for the 10th test under its IMF-supported programme.
Among those, the primary surplus stands at $50.8 billion against an IMF target of $40 billion, and the net international reserves was US$2.44 billion at the end of September, compared with a target of US$1.44 billion.
Revenue performance for the first six month of fiscal year 2015-16 was ahead of target by $0.5 billion or two per cent, and was $25.1 billion or 13.4 per cent above those collected during the corresponding period last year.
Tax collection was $4.9 billion ahead of the budgeted $190.2 billion and better than last year by $26.6 billion.
“In the past, we have been quite concerned, if not critical of … tax collection, and what they have shown us this quarter and this year to date is that they can achieve those targets,” Byles said at his regular press briefing on Thursday.
Corporate tax performed above expectations by $1.9 billion and by $3.1 billion compared to last year.
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