President of the Private Sector Organisation of Jamaica (PSOJ), Keith Duncan has blameed Jamaica’s past macroeconomic instability for the escalating crime in the country.

“We are paying the price for not having a good economy, that is it at the end of the day. We are playing catch up,” stated Duncan, who is also co-chair of the Economic Programme Oversight Committee (EPOC).

He was delivering the keynote address at the official opening of the Montego Bay Chamber of Commerce and Industry (MBCCI) Expo 2020, held at the Montego Bay Convention Centre in St James last Friday night.

The PSOJ head argued that the shortage of funding prevented investments in security infrastructure.

Security Minister Dr Horace Chang, speaking ahead of Duncan, noted that since the Jamaica Labour Party formed the Administration in 2016, some $40 billion has been spent to improve the security sector.

“The country has invested significantly to try and make up for lost time. In total since 2016 we have invested well over $40 billion and if we finish this year we will go into $50 billion in this sector. And the men and women in the force have begun to use the tools given to them. We have taken some steps that have begun to bear fruits,” Dr Chang said.

Duncan credited the political will of two successive political administrations to execute economic reform for creating the present fiscal space to be able to invest in national security.

“We have now created the fiscal space where we can start now to invest in national security which we underinvested in for so many years and we expect crime to be low. If we underinvest in our national security infrastructure, we underinvest in our people because we never run a good economy; we underinvest in our infrastructure, we never have no good roads — we just can start fix road now — how we expect that productivity going increase and don’t we expect all these people who are unattached and are squatters — don’t we expect that we are going to have crime?” he questioned.

He said in two years murders have come down from about 60 per 100,000 to about a little over 48.5 per 100,000 in 2019.

“We are three times the Latin and Caribbean average and eight times the world average in terms of the murder rate. But we have been here for about 20 years, we have been here for a least 20 years and the time has come where there are some decisive actions that are being taken, real actions that are being taken to move us and move the trajectory,” argued Duncan.

He was quick too add: “But you don’t undo 30 or 40 years of an economy that has underperformed and not deliver the resources so that you can invest in your country. The infrastructure, the national security, your education, your human capital transformation we have underperformed as an economy.”

Duncan also had major concerns with the high percentage of the nation’s untrained workforce.

“Now of that 1.2 million number that are employed, 64 per cent are not certified — so 800,000 people of the 1.2million are uncertified workers. That’s a number. So we have a little challenge, right?” argued Duncan.

The MBCCI Expo 2020 ran from Friday to Sunday under the theme: ‘Success through Enterprise’, attracting just under 100 exhibitors.