MINISTER of Finance and Public Service Fayval Williams gave a breakdown Wednesday of the $67 billion that was allocated by the Government to various ministries to revive crucial local sectors following devastation caused to parts of the island by Hurricane Melissa on October 28 last year.

The minister explained the spend during a post-Cabinet press briefing at Jamaica House in St Andrew.

“I am here to just walk through, pretty quickly, where that went to and what ministries and how it got there. During the last fiscal year, we did a third and a fourth supplementary in order to allocate funds to ministries,” Williams said.

According to the minister, in the third supplementary, $189 million was allocated to the Office of the Prime Minister. The Ministry of Tourism was allocated $3.4 billion to support the tourism sector. Williams pointed out that the funds that went to tourism were used to repair infrastructure that was damaged and to assist workers in the sector.

The Ministry of Economic Growth and Infrastructure Development received $7.5 billion for road repairs and clearing of debris, Williams said.

Only $57 million was allocated to the Ministry of Finance and Public Service. The Ministry of Water, Environment and Climate Change was allocated $3.2 billion.

The Ministry of Labour and Social Security got $1.2 billion altogether, Williams shared. The Ministry of Education received $2.3 billion. The finance minister further shared that $1.965 billion went to the Ministry of Health, with a special allocation of $35 million going to Bellevue Hospital in Kingston. The allocation for the Ministry of Culture, Gender, Entertainment and Sports was $280 million.

The Ministry of Agriculture received $3 billion while $20 million went to the Ministry of Industry and Commerce. The energy ministry was allocated $1.5 billion while the Ministry of Local Government and Community Development got $4.6 billion.

“That is a total of $29.4 billion and then you add the $25 billion that was loaned to the Jamaica Public Service Company, and that brings it to $53.6 billion in the third supplementary. In the fourth supplementary, there was $3 billion at the Ministry of Finance. At the Ministry of Labour, $10 billion was for the Restoration of Owner or Occupant Family Shelters programme, and the Ministry of Health and Wellness, $400 million. When you add the numbers, it is $67 billion,” Williams said.