KINGSTON, Jamaica — Prime Minister Dr Andrew Holness, says the Government will be making significant long-term investments in improving Jamaica’s road infrastructure.

“It is going to be a 20-year journey for us to get all our roads into the conditions where we can drive in comfort on all of them. Going forward, the Government is making the commitment, with the budgetary allocations from our [positive] economic performance, to build new roads, improve those roads and maintain them. For the first time, we are in a position that we can project to be able to do this,” he disclosed.

The prime minister was addressing a Diaspora town hall at the Lehman Center for the Performing Arts in New York on Saturday.

Dr Holness noted that Jamaica’s stable economic performance has been pivotal in facilitating investments in the island’s critical infrastructures.

Key among these are developments slated to be carried out under the $40 billion Shared Prosperity Through Accelerated Improvement to our Road Network (SPARK) Programme.

Holness pointed out that “For many years, we did not make the investments to keep the maintenance of our roads; in fact, we weren’t even keeping a full register of all our roads.”

“So when we announced the SPARK Programme, we also did a full register of our roads. We have over 21,000 … almost 25,000 kilometres of roadways. That puts us in the top 10 per cent of countries, in terms of roads per square mile. So we have very high road density, which means that the cost of maintaining and repairing roads would be significant,” he pointed out.

Dr Holness said with stable revenues and a long-term projected investment path, business operators can feel confident in the investments they make.

“The fundamentals of the economy are strong, and from the strong fundamentals of the economy, we are taking the dividends of that and we are doing some fantastic things,” he added.

Dr Holness said the country’s improved economic structure is critical to facilitating these investments, and emphasised the importance of the Diaspora’s role in growing the economy.

“The economy is still at a rudimentary level… there needs to be another step that Jamaica has to make. We have dealt with the fiscal element of the economy, meaning how we manage the resources that we get from taxes and how we spend it… [the] fiscal affairs. The next step where you (Diaspora) come in, now, is how do we grow and expand the economy,” he said.

Dr Holness pointed out that “We have a really solid economy now, that is generating revenues, [and] the important thing is [that these] revenues [are] stable.”

“Why stability is so important is because, if you have stable revenues, you can make long-term capital plans [and] long-term investment plans. I know that, with the economy as it is, we can make long-term investments in roads or healthcare or education or security, with stable revenues,” he underscored.

— JIS