The Jamaica chapter of the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) hopes that its five year US$90 million ($8 billion) budget for Jamaica will not be cut due to increased focus on Haiti following last month’s earthquake.

“I hope not but we are optimistic that it will not because our budget is modest,” USAID mission director for Jamaica, Dr Karen Hilliard said in response to an Observer query.

USAID representatives were invited to the weekly Monday Exchange held at this newspaper’s office in Kingston. Haiti was hit by a magnitude seven earthquake on January 12 that killed over 150,000 and Dr Hilliard said that reports indicate that “one in two Americans have given some form of aid to Haiti”.

But added: “We would do everything we can to promote Jamaica”.

One way to augment US aid to Haiti would be increased “south by south” support from developing economies including Jamaica, she said. The agency recently launched its new 2010 to 2014 Country Strategy for Jamaica with a budget of US$90 million for a number of projects and programmes in the island. The budget allocation is dependent upon the US congress, she explained.

Within its budget USAID plans to pump US$16.7 million over five years into a new tax reform initiative, hoping to help streamline the process, reduce corruption and improve the ease of doing business in the country. The investment will come alongside other long-running programmes which the agency has spearheaded. She added that this initiative “dovetailed” with the tax reform conditionalities under the current stand-by arrangement Jamaica is negotiating with the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

She said the overall thrust was aimed at improving compliance and tax administration by streamlining the processes and combining tax payments. Jamaica ranks poorly at 174 out of 183 countries in respect to the Ease of Paying Taxes according to the annual World Bank’s Doing Business Report.

The only countries behind Jamaica include Mauritania, The Gambia, Bolivia, Uzbekistan, Central African Republic, Republic of Congo, Ukraine, Venezuela, and Belarus.

The payment of taxes according to the World Bank “indicates the number of tax payments, time to prepare and file tax returns and total taxes as a share of profit”.

“We are also looking to broaden the tax base and lower the rates so everybody pays their fair share and nobody pays an exorbitant amount because the rest of the country isn’t paying,” she said.