NASSAU, Bahamas — The government’s “tremendous” economic and fiscal progress will soon be “touched, seen and felt” by many Bahamians, the deputy prime minister promised yesterday, The Tribune reported April 16.
KP Turnquest, speaking after the International Monetary Fund (IMF) released a relatively positive assessment of the Minnis administration’s policies and their execution, told Tribune Business that The Bahamas was “moving into a period of economic growth” following the “significant work” completed during its first two years in office.
He cited the government’s reduced fiscal deficit, end to successive, multiple sovereign credit rating downgrades and avoidance of the European Union’s (EU) blacklist as some of the accomplishments he believes have created a platform for Bahamian gross domestic product (GDP) to expand amid renewed investor and business confidence.
While the IMF warned that the persistent “double digit” unemployment rate, currently at 10.7 percent, will “decline only gradually”, Mr Turnquest yesterday voiced optimism that the jobless numbers would ultimately “catch up” with improved economic growth – especially if the Carnival and ITM/Royal Caribbean projects planned for Freeport came to fruition.
The deputy prime minister was equally upbeat on the Government’s prospects of hitting its 2018-2019 deficit target despite the IMF projecting that the “red ink”, or difference between its spending and income (revenues), will come in at a sum equivalent to 2.1 percent of GDP as opposed to 1.8 percent. http://www.tribune242.com/news/2019/apr/16/dpm-touch-and-feel-our-tremendous-work/
