Prime Minister presents 2001 budget
There was a time back in the 70’s and 80’s when the only mystery in government’s annual budget was how much the stamp tax and import duties were going to go up. These days it’s a different story and the budget speech is an opportunity for an activist administration to outline its strategy for development. News 5’s Stewart Krohn reports from Independence Hill.
Stewart Krohn, Reporting
The country has been under his stewardship for the last two and a half years, so Prime Minister Said Musa could not point any fingers at the previous administration…and he didn’t have to. With the economy apparently on a roll, the PM’s budget speech read like a report card for the brightest kid in the class.
Prime Minister Said Musa
“After falling to a rate of 1.4% in 1998, Real GDP Growth rebounded to an estimated 6.4% in 1999, and now despite Keith, up even more in 2000 to over 8% lead by sharp rises in export activity, services, domestic production, and construction.
The Unemployment Rate fell from 14.3% in 1998 to 12.8% in 1999 and is now down to 11.5%.
Domestic Exports of goods increased by 18.6% from $333.7 million to $395.7 million, an increase of $62.0 million from the previous year.”
And those exports are more diversified ever. After three decades as Belize’s number one agricultural commodity, sugar has been overtaken by citrus, which saw a dramatic increase in production. Bananas also improved, while shrimp farming jumped into the big leagues on the strength of record world prices. Lobster held its own, while papaya exports jumped almost seventy percent over 1999. The rise of tourism has been well documented with revenues for 2000 estimated at two hundred and twenty-seven million Belize dollars. With the private sector pushing the economy in the right direction Musa focussed on the public accounts.
Prime Minister Said Musa
“The budget brought to this honorable House today continues to be guided by our determination to eliminate poverty.”
“It attempts to manage the recurrent budget for a more efficient public service, which is cognizant of public criticism and the imperative to build a meritocracy. The capital budget is programmed to provide Belizeans with the opportunities necessary to develop themselves in an ever more competitive world. Recurrent revenue is projected to be $367.5 million with expenditure at $346.4 million for a recurrent surplus of $21.1 million. Domestic capital expenditure is programmed at $61.6 million with a domestic operational surplus of $16.5 million with some $78.1 million coming from capital receipts and the recurrent surplus.”
“Foreign funded Capital 3 projects programmed and phased are at $78.9 million. This will be funded by some $7.5 million in grants and $71.4 in loans.”
“Calculated by IFI standards and reversing out $64.2 million in loan principal payments and grants, this should leave us with an overall deficit of some $14.7 million or one percent of GDP –well below the internationally acceptable level of 3%.”
“The new Special Reconstruction Fund is now set for $30 million in expenditure to be covered by concessionary lending and grants.”
In addition to the IDB financed hurricane fund, the budget presentation also outlined a number of specific projects for the upcoming financial year. These included familiar faces like the Social Investment Fund and Basic Needs Trust Fund along with new initiatives in agriculture, including a ten million-dollar soybean project for the north.
Basic infrastructure continues to remain a priority with the Southern Highway, Boom Road and Orange Walk bypass slated for funding. Other projects include improvements in health, education, housing and tourism. One initiative sure to cause a stir is an ambitious programme in the communication sector.
Prime Minister Said Musa
“Our government has entered into contract with LG Electronics Inc. and ITL of Belize for a self-financing wide band wireless and fiber-optic system along with 5,000 computers, which will provide our schools across the country with Internet ready access through the most modern technology for the production of bandwidth and connectivity.”
“This initiative gives us ownership of crucial technology transfer, invests in a new tomorrow for our children, and for the first time could produce the opportunities necessary for Belizeans to take on globalization with a clear purpose. We must get the best technologies to our students and get it now. Already much time has gone. With technology, as Marion Jones has shown, our young Belizeans can compete with the best in the world”
What Musa didn’t say is that the project is also the opening round in the liberalization of Belize’s telecommunication industry. Glenn Godfrey’s ITL appears to be emerging as the competition of choice to Michael Ashcroft’s BTL.
And while the businessmen may rumble in the future, today Opposition Leader Dean Barrow found that the Prime Minister’s budget is not all that he’s made it out to be.
Dean Barrow, Opposition Leader
“I’m very worried by some of the things that have been admitted and some of the things that have not been admitted. Dealing with the first category, the public debt has gone from, it’s just about doubled in one year, so that it is now, on the admitted figures, the external and the domestic debt, just under a billion dollars. That doesn’t include the hundred million under the Mortgage Securitization Programme, which is not being classified as a debt, but because it is government guaranteed, properly speaking, ought to be classified as part of the debt.”
“Also, these figures are, with respect to the disbursed debt, so the committed debt, monies that have actually been signed for but not yet drawn down, are yet to be included. We therefore are looking at a debt picture of well in excess of a billion dollars. The projected debt service payment for next year is eighty-six million dollars, that’s where I’m very worried. That’s the first point.”
“I don’t accept the GDP Growth figure of eight percent. If you talk to some of the external monetary agencies, the diplomats that are here for some of the embassies and some of the international financial institutions, you will find that there is great skepticism.”
Barrow and the rest of the opposition will get to have their full say when the debate continues on March fourteenth. Stewart Krohn for News 5.
A full text of the budget speech is available at the government’s website. The address is www.belize.gov.bz.
