THE Jamaica Social Investment Fund (JSIF) says that it has lost control over social interventions programming in most communities, but believes that with sustained government support it can still carry on its work.

The issue came up on Wednesday as Parliament’s Public Administration and Appropriations Committee (PAAC) probed the huge reduction in JSIF’s budget support for 2013/14, and complaints from members of Parliament that the fund is failing to respond to the needs of their constituents.

Government members, Fitz Jackson and Denise Daley, expressed frustration with JSIF’s inability to address social issues in their St Catherine constituencies, with Jackson suggesting that the MPs “might as well give up”. But JSIF’s managing director, Scarlette Gillings, urged them no to.

“I sense the frustration of persons asking and we are not able to respond but don’t give up,” she said, noting that there were still communities benefiting from its interventions,

“We see changes and you can count them — the communities that we have intervened in over the last five or six years. However, we don’t have the unlimited funds. But, I think the thrust now would be towards getting enough funds that we can go back to our roots,” she stated.

Gillings was lamenting the fact that 95 per cent of JSIF’s budget, which usually comes in the form of grants from overseas agencies, was now primarily aimed in another direction , targeted at government programmes aimed at promoting public safety, agriculture and inner-city and rural development, instead of the community-based innovations of JSIF.

“Again, this is something that has to be looked at, and that will be brought to the attention of the new (JSIF) board, because over the past five to six years there has been a shift towards more of these targeted interventions,” Gillings insisted.

She said that it is a question of the community-based, and sometimes NGO-led projects JSIF promotes, versus the sectoral projects being pursued by other government ministries and agencies, with most of the social intervention aid now going into budget support.

JSIF’s report to the committee showed that for 2013/14, while the agency had requested a budgetary allocation of $2.4 billion, it had only received $1.8 billion, representing 25 per cent less than what was needed. Based on the reduction, JSIF has had to adjust a number of its projects.

Gillings said that, with a significantly reduced budget and closing agreements, the challenge remains for the timing of procurement in planning and, for the next financial year, to allow for the signing of contracts close to the start of the financial year, and not incurring commitments for which there is no budget.

Gillings said that some sectors and some ministries are very powerful, in terms of their articulation and what they perceive as the priority, hence the change in priority.

“I have been thinking about it for sometime, because I somehow think that at times the community-based [programmes] are somewhat shortchanged in terms of budget support,” she said.

Chairman of the PAAC Edmund Bartlett said that he was interested in what the committee could do to assist the process. “I think that is an important point for us to consider as members in determining how we move forward,” Bartlett suggested.

Permanent Secretary in Office of the Prime Minister Onika Miller, meanwhile, denied that there was a “lopsided approach” to how the ministry allocated the resources. However, she pointed out that JSIF was designed to treat with a community response and, therefore, it may be necessary to look at how the resources are being allocated.

JSIF has had discussions on its financial problems with the Ministry of Finance and Planning, and has received support for re-allocations within the portfolios. However, Gillings explained that this would have to remain within the total budget already approved.