 Good morning. Welcome everybody. Welcome to the launch of the strategic plan 2020 2023 for the department of Economic Development Housing Urban Renewal Transport and Civil Aviation. I am your MC Glenn Simon and we'll begin this morning with prayers and we call on Mr. Evans to Graces Please stand Just come forward and you just Let's all bow heads for prayer God You are the purest definition of love In the desire to make a share in this love you sent your son to the world to come to our aid In his great love for us all Christ said that whatever we do for the least among us we do for him We give you thanks for calling us to be your people and For giving us your son as our Lord and your spirit to guide our lives Bless us all gathered here today Open our hearts to the actions of your Holy Spirit Search and transform our hearts help us realize our dependence on you Make us aware of the great Responsibility that you have interested to help us Help us come to the realistic decisions for the good of our nation Father May your spirit of wisdom Guide us in moments of difficulty and lead us to make right judgments for the welfare of your people We make this prayer through Christ your son in the love and unity of your spirit now Always and forever and we all see a man Okay, so welcome again and we move right into the event Allow me to recognize persons in the room Honourable Alan Shastney Prime Minister and Minister for Finance Honourable Guy Joseph Minister for Economic Development Housing Urban Renewal Transport and Civil Aviation Mr. Claudius Emmanuel Permanent Secretary Departments of Economic Development Transport and Civil Aviation Chief Economist Mr. Tommy Descartes Permanent Secretaries. I'm not seeing any of the Permanent Secretaries here heads of department and Persons from various agencies I see Wasco Do we have any other agency here? We also have staff of economic development Staff of the Department of Finance other staff members here the media specially invited guests ladies and gentlemen. Good morning a Strategic plan. I think it is more than important to have a clear vision and a clear direction and The strategic plan is very apt in terms of where we want to go and to tell us more about it We're gonna have welcome remarks from Mr. Tommy Descartes the chief economist Miss our experts in sanitization is going to take care Thank you very much Glenn Master of ceremonies Honourable Prime Minister and Minister for Finance The Honourable Alan Michael Shastney Minister of the Responsibility for Economic Development Transport and Civil Aviation Honourable Guy Joseph Mr. Claudius Emmanuel Permanent Secretary in the Department of Economic Development Transport and Civil Aviation Miss Pearl Alcindor Deputy Chief Economist in the Department of Economic Development Transport and Civil Aviation Responsibility for Economic Planning Miscary Joseph Matthew the Deputy Chief Economist in the Department of Economic Development Transport and Civil Aviation And of the responsibility for national development Staff from the Ministry of Finance from the Ministry of Economic Development from invited agencies Welcome to you everyone And if you see I'm a bit not my usual self. I'm still struggling with the results in the US My cat my preferred candidate is not doing too well, but Today's launch of the division of economic planning and national development services strategic plan and the medium-term development strategies website marks another Significant milestone for the Department of Economic Development Transport and Civil Aviation One that is certainly worthy of adulation and recognition The mandate of economic development is a daunting feat to put mildly It requires on the one hand dexterity or thought Underscored by an aptitude to think critically and to challenge the status quo and to fought lead when necessary In order to effectively and efficiently guide the prioritization of development initiatives in a resource constraint small island development state analogous to St. Lucia On the other hand it requires continuous monitoring of implementation problem-solving Troubleshooting to manage and mitigate the plethora of risk both internal and external that thoughts any development process All the while continuously engaging with the donor community to align its country's development agenda to the first change in global development priorities further Developmental efforts are becoming more difficult Compounded by new and emerging global development risk such as climate change and more recently the unfolding of the coronavirus pandemic and it underscores the need for a robust development planning agency and Fremont of St Lucia is to successfully navigate the 21st century's challenges The division of economic planning and national development services which falls under the auspices of the Department of Economic Development Transport and Civil Aviation and under previous ministerial configurations with very Norman creatures is the government agency within the government of St. Lucia that is entrusted with this task The division although being part of the government of St Lucia's machinery since post independence It has seen its prominence and efficacy as the development planning nucleus of St. Lucia works and wean over the years This strategic plan is a bold attempt to reverse these fortunes But more so to establish a systems approach to the work of the division As a guided instrument, it will limit the internal operational risk of the division and in due course will result in the division becoming a more cohesive and coordinated economic planning vehicle Additionally, it will ground the division in an ethos of evidence-based policy interrogation and implementation While ensuring that the vision remains on the frontier of the international development policy dialogue and ideation While equally embracing and deriving indigenous policy solutions The ultimate goal being the sustained socio-economic improvement in the well-being of St Lucia and its citizens Having launched the 2020-23 medium-term development strategy This strategic plan will invariably buttress and complement the implementation of this landmark development policy instrument for St. Lucia Working in tandem these two critical policy instruments will serve as the guiding document of the division as well as St. Lucia and the many development partners and stakeholders At the minimum it will dispel the uncertainty regarding what the division does and the value proposition it offers I Uge all Most of all the cadre of economists that are tasked with this mandate to embrace this strategic plan and a new vision for the division and the country It would be remiss of me not to lend Salutations to the leadership of the department in both the minister in the person of the honorable guy Joseph and the permanent secretary Mr. Claudia Simonell who have supported this process Unwaveringly from the start to finish I would also like to acknowledge the hard work of the staff of the division in the process of miss Paul Alcindor and miss Kerry Joseph the deputy chief economist in the end of the department as Well of the staff who provided the invaluable input to this document Additionally on behalf of the Department of Economic Development Transport and Civil Aviation and Also the division of economic planning and national development services I acknowledge the contribution of the many stakeholders local original and international Who contributed in this process and to see in this document to fruition today Enclosing I wish to convey heartfelt thanks to all who so it fit to attend this launch either in Person or virtually here today and please do enjoy the rest of the proceedings. Thank you very much Thank you very much. Mr. Descartes and One thing that you said that stayed with me here is that This document will dispel the notion of what exactly the department does and even how it aims to achieve its work And to lead that process and to continue that process is none other than the the PS who has the responsibility for the the ministry and We call him now to give some words some remarks about the strategic plan. Mr. Claudius Emmanuel Thank you very much Glenn and good morning to all in attendance Both here in this beautifully decorated room as well as those joining us virtually honorable Allen Michael Sharsney prime minister and minister of finance Honorable Guy E. Joseph minister of economic development housing urban renewal transport and civil aviation Mr. Tommy Descartes chief economist miss Pearl Alcindor deputy chief economist Mrs. Kerry Joseph Matthew deputy chief economist colleagues friends ladies and gentlemen Today I am delighted to see the launch of the strategic plan of the division of Economic planning national development services for the period 2020 to 2023 Over the years the Department of Economic Development Transport and Civil Aviation Has been the recipient of numerous ministerial Configurational experiments As a result the department which is entrusted with the mandate of chatting the country's economic development Has had to constantly adjust and readjust to these internal changes Although not enshrined in legislation that mandate has remained unchanged however With the process of time and given the absence of a clear strategic plan The division's image in the eyes of stakeholders has diminished Today's launch of this strategic plan Therefore is a decisive effort at reasserting the crucial role that the division must play in contributing to Senucia's socio economic development It is widely accepted in development literature that institutions are a critical and essential variable in the economic development formula Equally the literature records numerous accounts of economic ruin That emerges a result of the absence of strong pro-growth institutions Unfortunately for us in St. Lucia. We have a suboptimal configuration of institutions The very ones that must jointly collaborate to deliver our collective economic aspirations It is my firm belief therefore that this suboptimal configuration has resulted in significant efficiency losses that if quantified will easily amount to millions of dollars As a resource poor small island developing state. There are many structural features Which we cannot directly change However, the effective and efficient utilization of the limited available resources is something that is directly within our locus of control As such we are obliged to do all that is possible to strengthen our institution our institutional frameworks. I Wish to highlight that this plan is the result of Significant indigenous or in-house work from my team here at the Department of Economic Development Transport and Civil Aviation This is not the work of an overseas consultant that came with a template that has been imposed upon us Instead it highlights our own reflections on how we can with existing resources Take a critical look at ourselves and make the necessary adjustments To deliver our mandate Therefore, I wish to commend this approach to the Minister for Finance As something that he would want he would wish to see replicated across departments within the public service This strategic plan being launched here today is a means to an end It seeks to provide the division of economic Planning and national development services with a clear operational mandate for the next four years Accordingly the plan complements as you heard from Tommy. They nashed the medium-term development strategy for the period 2020 to 2023 The plan recognizes that the international development landscape in which we now exist bears little resemblance to what we had 20 years ago as a Result for the division to effectively deliver on its mandate. It must learn to be nimble and responsive More importantly the plan emphasizes that the division must provide soft leadership particularly in the area Particularly in an era that should be that is replete with disruptive technologies and economic and political developments This strategic plan clarifies the role and mandate of the division To the chief to the team of economies who will be executing it through interface with our stakeholders It also guides our It also guides other agencies on the menu of development support that resides within the division and which are available to various ministries This strategic plan recognizes that to remain on the cusp of the development frontier Would mean that the national development planning cycle must be a constant within the department As such it seeks to embed a robust mandate of policy analysis and engagement across sectors To do so the division will be engaging in an annual national development policy forum Which will convene the best and brightest minds to discuss key development challenges and opportunities That have direct implications on st. Lucia Additionally the division will implement the public sector investment program PSIP Which will constitute a suite of bankable projects that are fully assessed and implementation or shovel ready it will also strengthen monitoring and Evaluation framework to monitor project implementation Such interventions and more will directly add value to st. Lucia's development plan in framework But more importantly will auger well for the well-being of the ordinary St. Lucia Before closing I would like to recognize individuals with whom the strategic without whom that should be this strategic plan would not have been possible First of all Prime Minister Alan Shastney himself a pioneer in this development in its previous manifestation Minister economic of economic development transport and civil aviation Honorable Guy Joseph for his stellar leadership and Also the leadership within the division We have heard from chief economist Tommy Descartes as well as the deputy chief economist in Paul Alcindor and Kerry Joseph Matthew Of course, I wish to recognize the effort of the entire team of the division as well as the wider department who Contributed to the final product being launched here today I would also like to recognize the input of all agencies who contributed to the content of the document We thank you for your input as well as your feedback and Last but not least I wish to acknowledge mrs. Betty combi our local consultant for her invaluable work in putting this document together Thank you for your professionalism and constant enthusiasm Which made the process a very enjoyable one? So if these comments I wish to thank everyone for joining us here today both physically and virtually To launch the strategic plan and the MTDS website. Please enjoy the remainder of the proceedings. I thank you Thank you PS and one thing that you said that was very instructive and The level of pride of which he said it that this plan is home grown it is born out of the efforts of staff and that means that the staff are truly proud of those efforts and It it means that the plan will be workable and doable and executable and to tell us some more about it And give us some key elements of this plan We call on miss pull Alcindor who's a deputy chief economist for economic planning Let's welcome her and pull. I will do what you did for all of us Good morning. Allow me to adopt the protocol that has been established and to also say miss yes, I don't know. I will take you through Some key components of so I will take you through some of the key components of our Strategic plan and as Pierre said it is it the plan will evolve and was developed with our effort It was not something that was imposed on us So we embrace the the plan so it's my pleasure to share with you what is included in our plan But before we go into the plan I will tell you the three components of the plan that we will talk about today We will establish the purpose of the plan. We've heard we from the chief economist and the PS We have gone through several configurations as a department So we wanted to establish our clear purpose for us as a department our situation analysis What for us to be able to give clarity to what we how we want to shape our strategic direction? We had to examine our self critically then look through our strategic framework What is entailed in our strategic framework and also the implementation framework? So it is one thing to establish your your strategic framework and another thing to implement So we will also be looking at the implementation framework to bring about the strategy that we have defined But first let us go through the timeline What was the timeline that was involved in in producing this? Critical document for our department. We started this process with Betty Combee our local Consultant and she embraced this assignment Wholeheartedly her enthusiasm was unwavering throughout the process so we met with her in November of 2019 by January of the following year 2020 this year we had our first draft of the Strategic plan with all and we had a workshop to ensure we shape and Involve our input and by March we had validated the The strategic plan so come April we were fully prepared to implement and move ahead and roll out our initiatives in the strategic plan So we go into our purpose One of the things that you hear when we engage agencies or people people would always ask Kisa economic development cafe. What is it that economic development is all about? So therefore this strategic plan help us give clarity in terms of what it is that we do So we did the plan to establish a clear strategic direction for the period 2020 2023 And this complements the launch of the MTDS which will be done through the same period Also, it helps it will help us in terms of our operational efficiency of how we're going to provide Value to out the agencies we interface with How we going to enhance our capacity the staff that is supposed Action the the strategic plan to to increase the capacity to deliver the plan And also how it is that we are going to improve our relationship with our stakeholders So these are the four things that we want to establish when and by Formulating this plan So to formulate the plan we had to go through our situation analysis and to do our situation analysis To get a clear idea as to our strength our weaknesses our challenges and opportunities What we did we went through and examined our organization in terms of the history You heard PS and also the chiefs speak about the number of transformation We went through as a department But what remained at our core was economic development and economic planning We examined our mandate. We looked at our structural Whether we were structured to deliver with efficiency to bring value We looked at our demographics. We looked out also our We did a value chain analysis of the services being offered and we did that against um In a analytical framework strategic analytical framework, which is the pestle So the pestle we examine what what is happening in the External environment as well as a sword to look at our core weaknesses and strengths. So this is this um Was the approach where that we used to critically evaluate and assess ourselves honestly To be able to frame our strategic response so this brings us to our Um strategic framework and as we how we see ourselves as the department We want to be recognized as stakeholder focused Team oriented and thought leading agency driving sustained socio economic development So this is how we see ourselves as the department that is supposed to coordinate um national development Our mission we see um What we what gives us purpose and what we do why we do it It is articulated in our mission statement and in that mission statement. It says We are as a coordinating agency. We see we are coordinating sent Lucius national development agenda through economic planning sector performance evaluation resource mobilization to support sustainable growth and development so with our Mission statement if at any point you're going to ask yourself kiss our economic development cafe I would encourage you to refer to our Mission statement and it tells you what we do and why we do it. So just to um We iterate we are involved in National development and we are doing this through economic planning sector performance evaluation resource mobilization to support sustainable growth and development And our mandate what gives us our authority to carry out the policies of the The government in the interest of national development and the primary our p.m. Was Very integral in shaping our mandate And the mandate that we develop in the in collaboration with our minister and the prime minister is To manage resources of the state to maximize output in a sustainable way whilst preserving the authenticity of brand st. Lucia and you know as a people we are Very unique and our national development formula our national development agenda has to embrace our uniqueness as a people So to bring about our vision our mission and to execute our Our strategy What do you expect from us as a department in the way we do our work and even conduct ourselves? It means therefore we are Evidence based every policy every action is supposed to be we are we shape our self and we position ourselves for our strategy Our policies to be driven by empirical data. So we are going how we conduct ourselves based on evidence Um, and our our chief insist every day that when you any proposal he will ask you where is the evidence? So this is ingrained in us already Um responsiveness where we will respond to our national development needs and also the the agencies that we interact with also May the other tenets of how we're going to conduct ourselves is Efficiency and effectiveness that means simply we are going to do the right things the right way and if we are Influenced by the empirical data you would expect that we would be doing the right things the right way And of course our last core value would be inclusion where we have we ensure That we have buying in the things that we do in the interests of development So what is our what are our strategic priorities our strategic priorities centers around? Our stakeholder engagement and the relationships that we have with our development partners and the citizens of St pollution by extension Our awareness visibility and how we have been accessed as a coordinating agency for development Our operational efficiency our capacity and the competence of our team that will be developed to Deliver on our mandate The resource prioritization and utilization as it relates to our priority projects and also The last priority is to use technology to better deliver our mandate So I will give you a snapshot as to how all of this fits So for us to achieve our vision What are the things that we have to do very good as a department? One it means that we have to at our operation We have to be very we have to be excellent at our level of operation our relationship. We have to establish very good relationship with our Development partners our and the agencies that we interface with and our capacity We have to continuously enhance our capacity to deliver So by doing that then that Naturally tells us what as a department that we need to focus on so it means now in our Work program. It's supposed to be centered around our stakeholder engagement our efficiency operational and financial and learning and growth, which means that we are constantly and improving and enhancing the capacity of our team So all of this is to do what? To improve the quality of life of our citizens and to do that We do that by doing sector planning and that has to be done in a coordinated An integrated way and also the monitoring of our sectors So how it is that we organize to deliver this? This mandate and the vision that we have articulated for ourselves Previously in the department. We had two chief economists and one deputy When we reexamined ourselves we saw that the need for one chief economist supported by two deputies and with the two deputies What we had in our previous configuration is We would be responsible for departments and agencies When we articulated our vision we saw the need to broaden our scope to be more sector oriented So therefore there would be one one chief economist would be responsible for The economic sector and the other chief economists would have Responsibility for the social sector. So that's we we would coordinate and integrate between us So that we don't have a silo approach so that we would be working together to ensure that there is balance between the economic sector and social sector Okay, um, so In to get into more clarity in what we're doing. So for the economic the chief economists For the socials for the economic sector Would be looking at sector planning and development and in doing so would be formulating the national development plans Which includes the mtds also looking at economic policy development sector surveillance and evaluation and the economy is the deputy chief Who has responsibility for the social sector? The the function will involve um The sector performance evaluation and development So you'd see this deputy chief economists would be responsible for the capital projects assessment and recommendation resource mobilization and donor implementation So what is important to know? And what we recognize is to ensure that we were not formulating ambitious Pi in the sky document what we wanted to do is to be able to see How it is that this Would influence what we do every day? So we ensured that the the strategic plan had what we call your A balance core card So the balance core card what it does is to put a framework Where it is that we could monitor and evaluate and track our performance against the targets to achieve our vision So we have established our vision and our mandate. We looked at our function The balance core card gives us our targets and the way we're going to be measured as a as a division and that is going to help with our Keeping us accountable Okay, accountable and it's going to show transparency help with transparency where we in terms of our operation so From the balance core card. This is going to help us in defining our work program for the period 2020 2023 And it is going to be able and for that When we define our work program, it is now integrated in the performance evaluation and the performance target for each Economist, so what we do every day Let me just re-emphasize that what we do every day as economists within the department of economic development All our actions must be towards achieving the visions that we have articulated for ourselves So this is what is captured in this framework where we see that we understand the vision We understand how it informs our work program the activities where we engage with regards to our Ministries department and agencies and how it looks at our own performance. Okay So What are the key priority areas that you could look out for for us? um over the period 2020 2023 PS has mentioned a few of them you could look at we um Our next activity would be a policy forum Where we'll be engaging the the best and the brightest to be able to examine st. Lucia's Development framework challenge our our thinking and to come up with um solutions to our development Issues where operations are involved With regards to our operations, we're going to deliver on the on our flagship policy documents We have already delivered the MTDS and so our next effort would be the reform PSIP We also will be working on with regards to learning and growth How we're going to build a cohesive team to be able to bring about our vision and our mission so that's involved putting together a capacity building plan and also For to achieve financial efficiency what we were going to do one of our key activities is to be monitoring The budget allocations, especially where it relates to allocations to the priority projects in the PSIP and the MTDS So with that, I thank you Cool. I'm not saying you have anything, you know So let's have a little better round of applause for miss Alcindor Thank you so much. I got so much information there and some of the things that you said that really stuck um Stakeholder focused as part of this strategic plan implementation framework maximized output uniquely solution evidence-based inclusion efficiency and effectiveness Responsiveness deliver on your mandate Improve the quality of life for our people and I think this really stuck with me and the plans are Very very nice and some of the things that we always have a problem with this implementation and I think You seem to have a very clear vision with the strategic plan as to where to go and as we said earlier This is homegrown. So that means that it didn't come from external forces And I know somebody who's very passionate about planning and about execution is your minister and so we now invite honorable guy Joseph To give some remarks on the strategic plan. Let's welcome the minister. Let me wipe down for the minister Thank you very much. Mr. Master of ceremonies honorable prime minister woman and secretary chief economist deputy chief members of staff of the ministry and other invited persons the media Pleasant good morning to all It gives me great pleasure to stand here today to be part of this initiative Now I think that the persons who have spoken before me have done Justice To what is before us In terms of the strategic plan For the ministry of economic development So I may not venture into the details of what this program is Because I think between The chief economist the p.s And the deputy chief economist that they have done A very good job in explaining What it is and where What the direction we are looking at I remember back In 2007 2008 when I was minister for Communications works transport and public utilities We undertook A similar exercise to Make that ministry at the time the flagship ministry within the government and here I am today again being part of the formulation Of a strategic plan for another department of government Now I need to highlight that in my observations over the years The department of economic development Was usually Subsided or Not as visible as it should be under the ministry of finance And so the focus over the years was ministry of finance economic development So You are we were almost like Or this ministry Almost found itself as an illegitimate child in the process Because Permanent secretary and different persons There was never a minister From what I have seen who was strategic in being placed in the ministry of economic development We have seen a different vision and a different style of leadership In that There is an assigned minister To the department of economic development And that is separate and apart from ministry of finance and economic growth and Sometimes We do not pay that much attention to these things because it just comes you know Different governments come and different governments go and then You know, it's a configuration of ministries and of names But if we are going to achieve what we want to The division of economic development with its command it Which is around economic development And and I was particularly attentive to what Paul presented in terms of A sustained Economic plan something that can economic growth that can be sustained The problem with our economy over the years You get a year when the economy performs at a certain level And then for a few years it goes down So We always move in back and forth when you've made strides today tomorrow You lose the gains that you have made Now they say if you have no plan A sign of no plan Is an indication that you plan to fail If St. Lucia is going to achieve What we can which is To maximize our potential Every ministry every department of government every worker Must put the best foot forward in order for us to achieve You know over the years. I have been concerned about our measurements of economic growth Our measurements of development And I've always said At what baseline do we begin? So if we perform very badly this year Because of the covid situation The economic output is not going to be what it ought to be But next year when we begin to measure growth and development We measure from not from where we were in 2019 But we measure from 2020 and we say we have 10 growth But when you use to have a million visitors visiting the island And then in a bad year You go down to 500,000 So by the time you get a 50,000 which takes you to 550 you say you have 10% Is that real growth? Are we really growing when we measure in this manner? And that is the point that we need to come to to realize That if we are going to sustain the standard of living that we want for our people That we must do a better job At evaluating and using baselines and that is why I am always intrigued by how The prime minister measures What we do So he said over the years When we focused on agriculture it was yield per acre So how much? Do we produce when we were producing bananas of a hundred thousand tons How many tons did we get per acre? And we left our measurements just to this And when he came in and he said okay If a hotel is going to be built and you are going to occupy 10 acres of prime land in St. Lucia, what is the expected yield per acre? For the space that you occupy how many jobs do we expect you would create? What is the return? To the or the impact on the economy and that is where our role In the process of economic development is very very critical Another area is that if we do not grow This economy and let's look at what COVID-19 has done to us We should have had reserves and A good economist would tell you You always need to have something stashed away somewhere For the difficult days And even when there is the temptation to use it We should avoid Who would have dreamt That today The whole world Would be in an economic crisis Brought about By something that is so small that the naked eye cannot see A virus Brought the entire world economy to a standstill And everybody is looking inward as to how they are going to address their concerns What is our own capacity and capability internally? To take care of ourselves For a month for two months for three months for six months And when I heard the prime minister even up to yesterday highlighting That st. Lucia should at least have a reserve of funds That would carry us for at least six months I know that is strategic thinking and that is thinking that we need to implement Because you will not always get the help from outside We have to be responsible Now, how do we become responsible? Because I like the strategic plan. I I like the idea of the vision The mission and the strategic objectives that we have set out In the midst of everything We have not allowed ourselves to be sidetracked even by the pandemic We were able to launch our medium-term development strategy We have our key performance indicators I love the banners, but I don't want this to remain a banner And I don't want What we have planned To become another set of documents on the shelf Or on a hard drive It must become something That is realistic that there is buying by our department first and foremost Every economist, every staff member, every cleaner in the building Need to get a basic understanding Of what the strategic plan and what the end goal ought to be Because without that We are not going to achieve what we want You know We talk about building resilience We talk about sustainable development All of those things I want to ask you Have we figured out to grow this economy sufficiently? What are the best things that we need to do? And there is a big debate in St. Lucia that all our eggs are in one basket Tourism And everybody is saying diversify I am a bit taken aback Every time you do something, you have to diversify So when it was bananas, you remember? Some of you may be old enough to remember the glory days of bananas And the topic of discussion was When WTO and our preferential treatment ends and all of these things We need to be diversified And some people seem to think that there was not diversification But there was a lot of diversification from bananas Into the service industry A number of persons went in a different direction How sustainable is it when we diversify? And so we try to think, well We should go back to agriculture so we can be more self-sustaining We can reduce our food import bill And some people think it's tourism or agriculture And I remember And I love the banana the way that they put it Not because the two of them are at the top But because they are side by side Agriculture and tourism Because the more you grow, the more you grow Because the more you grow tourism The more opportunities there is for agriculture to grow When the people come here, they have to eat So at the end of the day For us as a department There's a lot that we need to be doing I understood that in shaping this plan One of the key areas or As a division we aim to be recognized As a stakeholder focus Team-oriented and thought-leading agency Driving sustained socio-economic development Now if we are going to drive that development Have we figured out What is the best method of road construction that we should use in this country And what do I mean by that? You'll tell me but we are not engineers inside here We need to go to the ministry of infrastructure And ask them what should we do in road construction But I'm looking beyond that What is the best material to use to build a road in St. Lucia For a prolonged period so that it can give you The time period that you require but beyond that that it can have the greatest impact on the economy So if I build a concrete road or if I build an asphalt surface road Which one has a greater impact on the local economy? Have we figured out which one uses the most material That is indigenous to St. Lucia So these are the things housing I've asked that question many times Which house is the best house to build in St. Lucia? In terms of not necessarily the most attractive house But which one or which material In construction would have the greatest impact on the local economy Because one of the things we have to seek to do if we are going to sustain growth and development Is to keep as much of the money in St. Lucia as possible so that we can allow our own economy to grow Now the cheapest house Is the house that you cannot buy anything from St. Lucia to build We don't have any of the materials So is that the best method to build? So if I'm looking at sustained growth and development I would want to be able to approach the minister of finance and say to him It is costing us a little more to build these houses But if we give a concession to the people at least the first time home owners Who are going to use material that is indigenous to St. Lucia That we would help offset the price for them by giving them concessions On maybe some of the other things that they have to import So that it can reduce the price and you can have a greater impact on the local economy That is where our strategic thinking needs to go in order That St. Lucia can advance on its own Coordinating St. Lucia's national development plan through economic planning Sector performance evaluations and resource mobilization To support sustainable growth and development without that approach I mean i'm proud to hear And I know we had discussions on it ps That we did not have to look outside of St. Lucia to find a consultant To help us come up with a strategic plan Can you imagine if we had brought in a consultant what it cost us And all of the money we would have paid would have gone out whereas when we engage our own people Then the money stays in St. Lucia that is what our economy needs to grow So our approach is critical I remember and looking at the covid situation and what it has done to the economy at this point in time I remember former prime minister dr. Anthony saying that something happened in St. Lucia that had never happened before That we could not raise the required revenue And clearly It is because successive governments over the years We have not had a very strategic approach towards How we develop and grow the economy And it is difficult Because When you don't have the money you don't have the resources But you need to get the things done you are left with no choice Once you can borrow you will borrow Or you will tax And there's only a certain amount of tax That you can put on the people and then it begins to be diminishing returns so you tax too much People stop investing they they feel that the government so there must be a balance So our six key Areas agriculture tourism healthcare infrastructure education security At no point in time Can you eliminate any of these has been very important and very strategic For our growth and development So over the years I believe governments Have been more reactive You come in and you just try and manage ministries do that When we came in very early we asked can we go back to a zero base budget? And I think five years is coming to an end and we've not been able to go to a zero base budget Cut and paste every year That's our reality and I'm saying that we need to remove ourselves from that type of thinking And to begin to focus On the real things I I always say to people You the public servants The government the politicians are temporary employees When the people say they don't want us again, we have to go but you remain And because you remain You have a strategic responsibility And that's why I am pleased that the members of staff In the department have been involved in this process But I want to challenge you beyond where we are We must not always be a reactive government Reacting to every crisis. We must plan ahead. We must be strategic so that as soon as We have to anticipate That there will be more pandemics There will be more natural disasters With global warming climate change We have to start thinking of how do we do how do we plan for Building resilience And we must work towards achieving this unless we can do that All of us will suffer the consequences in the future So I want you not just to look at Where we are today But where we want to be You know, it should not be just The un Setting strategic goals And setting their agenda And then we have to yes, we have to work towards the sustainable goals of the un But as a country We ought to know what we need How do we plan for it and how do we achieve it? That is the key because we can have the best plan on paper If we cannot achieve it It is as good as the paper that it is written on So I challenge us in the department and those who are listening and all other ministries Let us begin to look at our country In a more strategic way Yesterday I had to say it again Politicians are not the best persons to bring certain messages because it is always seen through A political lens even though it's a good message But when the technocrats and the public servants who understand The whole process goes out and sells the idea of what we need to do Because we all will have to make sacrifices for us to achieve what we want to achieve You cannot party every night You cannot be on every line there is on the block And still save money because you are not earning enough to be able to do so So you have to make some sacrifices In the process if you are going to set aside something for wet days And as a country we need to begin to work towards that So I challenge my department and every other department of government That as we look forward in this strategic plan that we have in The medium term development strategy That we are going to work towards accomplishing what we need Because this is our beautiful country And no matter what happens. I mean I heard Tommy on What is happening in the u.s And the elections I mean Every country in the world is focused internally How do they take care of their own problems? And if they can deal with their own problems then They may look at how they can assist us. So we have to take first responsibility for ourselves We have to do what we must do for the advancement of this country. And I've always said I am proud that we have a prime minister who's very strategic in his thinking Who is very visionary Even in the in the cluster of ministries people didn't buy into it very early And still today there are some ministries that operate in silos by themselves. And they tell you that's my ministry And so if you go in there You get trouble. We are not seen as a government The entire government is not seen as a single government It is seen as individual ministries And so everybody tried to protect their tooth Rather than come and work together to accomplish the same thing. That is our reality You know sometimes as minister you go into you go into a department and the people there Don't even know They don't even want to allow you into the building Because we are not seen it as a government We are not seen it that we are one unit And that it is just made up of different paths. So ministry of economic development ministry of finance ministry of infrastructure ministry of tourism All of us make up The government together and all of us should be working towards the same plan So I want to take this opportunity to thank the ps Immanuel chief economist Descartes and the entire team the consultant Who did a great job? Even in the midst of kovid That did not stop the process from happening I am proud to be a part of this process with this ministry That in the midst of all that has happened We've been able to remain focused because I want to say to us here and to send lucians Kovid will not last forever There may be other challenges But we have to continue to work and to plan ahead So that when the right vaccine is found and the problems are resolved That we are ahead of the game and we are not starting And that is why we've been able to launch the medium term development strategy. We are now doing The strategic plan for the ministry the reconfiguration Because we believe That in this department We will continue to work To achieve and to put st. Lucia On a sustainable path to growth and development. I thank you and may god bless you thank you minister minister and Said some salient things right at the beginning You mentioned that if you have no plan then you really plan to fail and so referencing the importance of this particular exercise today and I had a lot of points that you you actually raised but in the essence of time Something that stuck with me sustainable growth and development to build resilience and build a resilient economy something that you stressed on and the importance of the department of economic planning So the department of economic planning has a lot of work And you said the ending part of it for me that government is one unit And I believe in this strongly that we have to operate out of the silos that we Operate and I hope those that strategic plan is going to be shared widely and not kept in the closets And on shelves and in you know corridors No one else could access it and somebody who's passionate about Working together about the economy about resilience about productivity is the prime minister And we invite him to the podium to have his remarks prime minister Thank you very much mr. Master of ceremonies Good morning everyone Um protocol being established um this morning I sat there this morning. I'm very proud um I think that when uh I was putting my cabinet together And persons heard that minister guide Joseph was going to be the minister of economic development There probably were a lot of persons that raised their eyebrows and were like Wow for sure. I thought he would have been the minister of infrastructure And transportation and I remember if you don't mind me sharing mr. Joseph The conversation I had with him Um when I was trying to convince him because he wasn't easily convinced initially I can assure you Um that I felt that this was a direction That he should go in and that I felt that persons only knew Him as one thing But in my interactions with him that his Understanding and intelligence was so much deeper than just that and one thing that um minister Joseph One quality that minister Joseph always had from the time that I've known him because um When I first got into politics I was given Less than 20 minutes to make a decision as to whether I wanted to be the minister of tourism And it was literally the next day That we were sworn in and it was at the prime minister's residence That I got to meet minister Joseph for the first time and it was actually sir john Who literally pulled me by my hand? After everybody had been announced and took me over to meet um to meet guy And guy had been introduced or had been given the portfolio of infrastructure and transportation And sir john said now I don't want you to make any decisions when it comes to the taxi drivers unless you speak to him um and I can say to you that um We became inseparable because our ministries were so closely linked in terms of seaports the cruise industry airports because of airlines and tourism um And certainly because of the taxi drivers roads because of infrastructure for for the industry And I certainly learned a lot from him But equally I think that he learned a lot from me And what we learned was is that when we get in a room together and share ideas And with the different perspectives that we have You tend to get a better decision at the end of the day and to his point that we were not territorial But it was at capacity in him Of understanding the need to coordinate As to why I I selected him and I was very grateful when he Took up the portfolio of economic development and I just want to say minister You really have done an amazing job and we're all very proud of you For what you've achieved um As was alluded to earlier today Um, my beginnings started in economic development. My first job Was as I'm I'm not so even sure that that position an administrative cadet. Does that still exist? Okay, so I mean that's the lowest of the tattern pole Um, I think the lowest thing you can have once you have a degree Um, and I did that for I think it was about six months until I became an economist one And I'm very proud of the fact that we had another visionary person in the form of mr. Doverne And also mr. Dwight venner and obviously sir john Who ultimately was the minister responsible? um persons like Ray Atkinson and adrian oj and Roy Rodriguez And jackie emmanuel albenteem Were the persons that were in this meeting my first chief economist was mr. Severin In fact when I first came on board he was already studying and so it was only at the end roddy sumer Was another person that we worked with and and in those days Planning was the enemy Anybody time any in the ministry saw somebody from planning coming in automatically they Correlated that they were going to lose control of something And I remember a particular ps um I won't I won't say his name And we got into a very big discussion about information And his argument was that Libraries were information and therefore his ministry was responsible for information And not understanding information was every single document that was in government And that we were putting a system in place in that it would be correlated that there would be one singular source Of the information that's how that's how far we've come Because exactly to minister joseph's point we operated in silos and central planning unit Came about because of that lack of coordination Of that lack of of sense of purpose And more importantly and again, this is not a criticism But many ministries don't have planning units within them So how they're making day-to-day decisions is really more one on reaction So they're looking at it based on how much cash they have available today Rather than looking at a long-term plan and even in terms of Priorities because as a small island developing state the one word that we have to become cognizant of is priorities Why priorities because the resources we have are so limited The other thing that's very key is what is strategy? Strategies of science On how do you combine limited resources in order to improve the level of output? I'm a sports person. How do you get a how do you get a team to perform at its peak level? It's strategy You have to look at what your resources are. What's the talent you have? And try to play to your strength and try to stay away from your opponent's strength So, you know in commerce we use words like economies of scale comparative advantages Right product differentiation These are all strategies that are used In order to be able to maximize the output I know as an economist And having the opportunity to spend one year In washington dc where I did at stints at the world bank in the imf And I mean bimber being so frustrated because I saw All these incredibly gifted people from around the world That were in washington dc And their Goal every day was to determine who got the best parking spot Who had access to what cafeteria? Who had a window office And what I quickly came to realize Is that really what matters Wasn't confronting them every day So being an economist here I drove to work every day Like some like other people I do like going to the grocery store I do like going down to the gardens and playing basketball I do like interacting with the community And it was in that interaction that you understood the need for change And that you were motivated every day Because in not performing our job as economist In maximizing the output of the resources we had People were suffering And when you're in washington dc very difficult very easy to forget those faces Not to hear the voices and not to have the sense of urgency And I think that that's what Caused me to be very different in planning You know, we had Roy Rodriguez who probably was one of the best persons I've seen in terms of doing a financial analysis or an economic analysis from a numbers perspective Agent oj who was probably one of the more gifted writers that I ever saw And what differentiated from them me from them And the talents that we had is I was probably the best executor That's what I measured my success on everything not by how many proposals I passed Or how many proposals were were approved But actually what happened on the ground So my message today Is to understand That we start from the top And most persons think the top is tourism in our culture and infrastructure. That's not the top The top is people And we have a priority to solutions And it's not to forget that objective that we have every single day And so planning and strategy Because you can put a plan together But if that plan doesn't indicate and take into consideration our weaknesses our our lack of resources That's where a strategy comes in. How do you find the best combination to produce the greatest output? But what is that output? Is that output as minister Joseph said GDP? Is the output unemployment? So there's something that kovat has given us and I think Mr. P s that it's something that we should implement It's called a dashboard And why can't we have on our website a dashboard? To remind people and to remind ourselves. What is it that we're trying to achieve every day? So it's not just unemployment And reducing it But it's the types of jobs What's the minimum salary? Do we believe that people need to be earning in order to have a minimum standard of living? And what is that minimum standard of living? How are we going to measure that? I've not seen anything that tells me what that is And that that's a moving number We have coefficients to tell us the amount of poverty But I keep on arguing Boy if eliminating poverty and how we define poverty becomes the goal I think we're in trouble And especially as a small island developing state and you know, sir John always used to say That solution solution and solutions are relatively poor I remember him going to the meetings at the World Bank in the MF saying that to them And they would look at him and say what do you mean? He says well We don't compare ourselves to some of the more impoverished countries in the world. We compare ourselves to America So what you may be satisfied with the population in Saint Lucia is not going to be satisfied with You know, and I would certainly like us to engage in a more deeper discussion As to what that is So when I go to Bermuda as an example and I see that a taxi driver goes on vacation twice a year I go that sounds good You know when persons have savings accounts and persons have a home When the institutions are working When people have access to health care when people have access to education What's that minimum level of education that we think that people should have access to? So I think we have a lot of work to do and that dashboard You know Should measure the synergy of resources And minister Joseph highlighted Output per acre You know, it's when I was having a difficult time as both a director of tourism and then eventually as minister of tourism In getting people to understand tourism and it's amazing thing to me. It's 85 percent of our foreign exchange In this country 85 percent of our foreign exchange comes from tourism and we just saw a number of 54,000 jobs so 14,000 jobs directly and 40,000 jobs indirectly and people say how is that even possible? What percentage of your farmer's product is being sold to the tourism industry? How much of transportation is associated to tourism? So we know that transportation is from an output macroeconomic output number Is a very good Indicator of economic growth in our country So how many taxi drivers? How many buses that are bringing staff transportation? How many buses and trucks are bringing products to the hotels? So I think the last time I checked it was almost 75 percent of the transportation sector was correlated to tourism When you went to the banks and you asked the banks what percentage of your loans are related to tourism The first number was 50 percent Then when I said okay flower shack 84 percent of their sales are to the tourism sector staff persons who have The education loans So if tourism were to close down tomorrow A person who's earning 12 14 15 thousand dollars a month at a middle management level And the hotel sector closed down. Where would they find an equivalent job? And if they can't find an equivalent job, what happens to the the loan? So, how do you see that loan? A person who has two buses that's providing staff transportation and in excess of 80 percent of his business is the hotels How do you classify that loan? And the banker soon came back to me and said 85 percent and counting Right, but here's the more frightening part Here is that we're a country that is dependent as we are in tourism and our knowledge of the industry Nothing even currently when we talk about diversification So diversification is a constant Goal of any country It ought to be because diversification also talks about maximizing So but even within tourism we can diversify So we we recognize in 2009 and 2010 that tourism was vulnerable in a recession But we did realize that romance tourism was not A person who is going to go on a honeymoon Regardless of what the recessionary period is going to spend the same amount of money In comparison to somebody who's taking a family vacation every year If the times are tough, they're going to cut back A person who's dating somebody for the first time And once to impress them and take them on a trip, they're going to spend money Somebody who's trying to make up with somebody they may have been fighting with they're going to spend money So it was that understanding and then all of a sudden recognizing that there was a huge market out there of people Who are still going to travel regardless of the recession in 2008 That allows us to re-trigger and we ended up bringing the bachelor to st. Lucia That's strategy We then hear numbers like leakages And we we we talk about this in tourism all the time the leakages in tourism Like okay really I'll give you an outstanding number an astonishing number I remember having that discussion with sir john and back in 2006 When I said to him that if you take The banana sector At its peak, which I think was 130,000 tons of bananas The gross earnings of it at that time was less than the salaries that are paid in tourism the gross earnings of banana sales Was less than What they paid tourism paid in salaries Because there's no argument that 99 point whatever percent of the salaries remains in st. Lucia And then if you start looking at leakages Our cultural sector, where's the fertilizer come from? Where the cars coming from? Where were the plastic bags coming from? And to minister joseph's point that those are the things that we need to know and ask ourselves Where is the possibility of import substitution? But import substitution is not always the panacea because there's some products that economies of scale are going to Outperform because if in fact you're adding cost to your production, it's a problem I'm going into this level of detail with you because as an economist you need to understand these things And we're blessed in the sense that the amount of industries that we really need to understand are minimal But those businesses we must know them intimately to understand the bigger picture as to whether we could make them competitive or not So today's launch is a very important one So first of all, I'm very proud of the fact that even before covid And doing the kind of interactions which all of you are familiar with as to how we came up with these six things That Solution solutions Got it right because post covid There's not one of them that we would change in fact Covid has said to us move faster move much faster and the this midterm strategy Which has taken us sadly Four years to get here Is now the foundation that we need in order to start building In all honesty, if we're going to look back backwards, this is something that should have taken us a year But I get it There is a lot of skepticism And I don't know why because all of this was evidence-based So there was a general discussion as to what people thought and then there was a deeper analysis in terms of Is there evidence there to support the selection of these of these focus areas for our midterm strategy? And we found out very quickly yes And so the question becomes why is it taking us so long to integrate this into our planning process? And then how is it just going to affect our planning process in the future because nothing is stagnant I have no idea what the new world economic order is going to look like next year And I can say that because The evidence that's out there suggests there has to be a change I mean america's debt to gdp is going to break a hundred percent Canada's fiscal deficit this year is going to be 17 percent Most of the european countries are going to be in excess of a hundred percent the debt to gdp So this 60 threshold or benchmark that's been established. What does that mean anymore? That if in fact And you can block your ears tell me That uh That the voting Turns out that the democrats are going to win The suspicion is is that they're going to pass the largest fiscal stimulus known to man I think we're all seeing an excess of three trillion dollars which would have been on top of the ready two trillion That they would have done so you're talking about I think that's almost 80 percent of the entire um gdp of the country That they would have spent What does that mean? In terms of where we're going the climate change in real And one of the things that is being proposed is the introduction of a carbon tax And a carbon tax will significantly change The the production of products And I I just use a simple example right now. We import tomatoes from miami Because we say that our farmers are in Inefficient or can't be as price competitive and part of it because we can't produce tomatoes on a year-round basis But all of a sudden if there's a carbon tax That's added on to the tomato All of a sudden our tomatoes might be a lot more competitive manufacturing of furniture Which takes advantage of economies of scale, but huge Outputs of of carbon emissions the transportation that of bringing inputs into one singular place and sending them back out All of a sudden it may be more cost effective for us to produce our own our own furniture from a cost perspective basis But that's something that has been long in coming because we now know Carbon emissions is not free Right. We're seeing it firsthand in our in our area And so we have a lot of work to do to try to anticipate Where is the world going to be going? And how do we fit in and remain competitive? so Education it's about capacity. What do I mean by that? How can you have an education policy that's not tied to what your Outputs are going to be Where where where are all these people going to work? Where do we believe that they have the greatest opportunity To work and to earn an income that what can afford to buy a house? I can afford to go on vacation. I can afford to pay for health care insurance And I can save money So it's not just about an unemployment number And we keep saying that GDP growth Is a meaningless number if in fact it doesn't also include distribution of income building resilience Matters for physically, but it also matters socially so COVID has certainly played on people's minds and Are we truly appreciative of the psychological fallout? The mental fallout That is ensued not everybody handles not knowing what's going to happen tomorrow as well as other people do And more importantly when you have nothing So when you have nothing and you've learned to survive on little And you know that okay how I can get by tomorrow and when that world is thrown upside down, how do we handle it? And as an economist and as a unit you have to feel that And the one part that we fail as civil servants. I have to say to you Is urgency so I'm I'm So emotionally distraught About what's taking place with health care Those of you who were at the meetings with me for the last four years Know how hard I have fought because I have said repeatedly Simply taking the same people in the same structure and putting it into the new building is not going to solve the problem In fact, it's probably going to exasperate the problem because the consumer going into a new building is going to expect More and when they can't deliver it, it's a problem And complicating matters even more is covid Because when persons arrive at the hospital Okay, e.u. And have any kind of respiratory symptoms Automatically, it's assumed that that person has covid And everybody backs up oh And they send the person down to vh and We say it, but do we understand it? That we were barely surviving trying to operate two hospitals sin jude and Vh and I and I find it tough to even say sin judes But a hospital facility nonetheless To now having to operate three So the human resources that we have are limited the financial resources we have are limited And now they're being even further diluted And so what does it require it requires proper planning? It requires a proper strategy as to how are you going to make it happen? And I am frustrated because I can't hold the persons who are trying to do that because they don't have the experience And here is it we've been trying to bring a team in for six months now to come and help You know and this morning I Lost it for myself because All arrangements were made for them to come down this weekend and now they can't come because the flights from the uk have been stopped And I'm being told I gotta now wait until december 6 And so all the visas and everything else that we did And I feel the pain of 30 more days But I think it's important that we all feel that pain because that pain Is what causes you to Act with a sense of urgency And to try to find alternative ways. I mean saturday morning When we heard that the uk was going to shut down or I heard that on friday Spent saturday and sunday talking to the us airlines About how can we get them to put more airlift because now you have hotels that were opening and having Staff on salary with with the inability of not generating any revenue And don't believe that these big hotels are not going through the same thing that we're going through in terms of cash cash flow If not had any income for six months All they've had is expenses And now they say okay, we're gonna start up when they go through this huge expense and then boom Can't bring people in so Immediately reacting and this is why I want to say is is that long-term planning and strategy works But laced in it sometimes you have to find yourself with that level of flexibility to Work now and I was saying to my cabinet That sometimes there's a lack of commerce In decisions we're making And I guess that's where I always get into a fight with everybody because everybody thinks i'm a business person Yes, i'm a business person, but the same business principles apply to anything that you're producing The the result you're trying to achieve is different, but the fact is is the principles of maximizing the utilization of resources or blending of resources is the same And I say that to you because sometimes we sit and we we come up with policies and strategies That sound great on paper and the teacher is going to give you an a But in practicality of implementing it It's not going to work Because there isn't that sense of urgency So even though that these are midterm strategies The sense of urgency of diversifying our seven crops and making it work is urgent The ability of finding a more effective and um commercially successful model for bananas There's a sense of urgency That we have to do that And village tourism and diversifying our tourism product There's a sense of urgency In health care And that's a huge challenge health care insurance is singularly the only way that we can solve this problem The question is how is that health care package going to look like in order for people to participate? So I think that we're doing something that's pretty novel this idea where government will continue to pay For salaries continue to pay for capital investment and continue to pay to utilities I don't I'm not being facetious when I say that because we do those things well Right. These are quarterly or monthly allocations and we seem to do those things extremely well um and the question is is that Putting an insurance mechanism in that we're keeping record of what's being used and then how we're going to repay it And coming out with what that number is going to be for the annual payment and how we're going to divide that money There's a sense of urgency Because as we're trying to figure out all those different things there are people who are suffering That's the reality So one thing I know about your your minister is that he truly appreciates and understands all those things I'm speaking about infrastructure We can't grow this economy without more Significant infrastructure and this is a sunk cost that we have to get in But in not making you can't bring more tourists here if you are going to be an airport. That's frustrated We can't bring goods to around the island if the roads are not fixed electricity capacity water production all of these things by themselves can just Um undermine any of the efforts that we have So I know I've gone off track mr. P. S From the great speech that you've given me But I felt that a lot of the things that we that you had here were things that you already have repeated And I think that the just one element that I just wanted to bring is ultimately the end of the day. We're all solutions More importantly, we're human beings We all have I think many of the same aspirations And let us not forget as economist and particularly this unit that that's who we're benefiting Don't get lost in the numbers then you have to dig deeper than the numbers and Ask yourself are we affecting change? And does it mean that you have to affect change for everybody? No But if you're making sure a community is being affected if you're making sure a sector is being affected That's how we start winning those battles And I can say to you that Whatever you learn here in san lucha Will be applicable all around the world. You're you're at the best university in the world Because if you started in a larger country very easy to fall into the numbers Because you just can't imagine how affecting one person's life Is going to change anything, but certainly I think when you're at this level And you've helped somebody and you see that the policy that you've done or a project you've done Is made a difference in people's lives That has to affect you. I don't care how hardened of a person you are you will be affected and certainly from My cabinet and my government That that's what we're trying to do affect change in people's lives And that's why we said we need to build in ucent lucha I'm building ucent lucha that was built on world class All right, we're not interested in mediocrity And let us not believe that we can't do it We can The success that we've had so far is pretty remarkable But the idea of 600 million dollars in reserves We have to do it We have to find a way to do it But if you keep fooling yourself that you don't and you keep on finding temporary solutions So for instance, that's why I never lie to solutions when they ask Um, you wanted the civil servants to help And yet we seem to have survived without it. I said no, we've not survived It came at an expense Payables went from 20 million dollars to 90 million dollars So there's 70 million dollars of money that should be in circulation in the economy. That's not There's small businesses or individuals who've not gotten paid There are people who are waiting for tax refunds who've not gotten it. That's where the money came from There's no free lunch So imagine if we were to be able to manage that situation better How much better off people would have been but here's the good news Right We got our october numbers and I think it was 89 million dollars in tax revenue for the month of october Um, and the goal was 103 So we have come a long ways. I mean we were at 1.50 million. I think one month we did 44 million dollars in tax revenue So we're seeing that we can the combination of the construction The it's ICT sector as well as what we're seeing in tourism That is working and a large part. I want to say thank you to all of you The extra hours to try to implement these projects quicker Because the longer that they stay as a piece of paper The more opportunities that are lost and an opportunity that we have today that we don't take advantage of It's the most perishable item I could never come back to is it november 5th today I could never come back to november 5th 2020 Whatever we didn't get today. We could never recover Right, and and so that's what I want to say to his opportunity is the greatest perishable Um product that we have and the entity that is the most responsible for making sure that we get it done Is you and it's not about having an ego about your department in terms of saying that we're the best It is about leading from the back And helping people get through the frustrations of the bureaucracy Convincing persons as to how important what we're trying to achieve is And so you are the greatest ambassadors we have towards economic development in this country And I want to thank you all for an amazing job that you've done over the period of time And I want to congratulate you on your midterm strategy and please be assured Certainly of the as the minister of finance and the prime minister of our continued support I want to congratulate the minister and also your team for the job you guys have done. Congratulations Thank you. Honorable prime minister Um, the prime minister went through if you didn't realize almost every ministry And it follows on what the minister, mr. Joseph said that we're one government And how interlinked we are Prime minister one thing that you said well the number of things that you said that i'm struck We need to start at the top and the top other people And we really need to remember that and that the main The main aim is to generate the greatest output And covet give us the impetus to move faster Maximize the use of resources Thank you so much for all your your words and your words of support to the department now we have a the launch of the website and also The unveiling of what this the strategy is so I called both, um, miss stanza deligney And miss poll alcindor and poll will do one part of it and stanza will do the presentation of the website Please welcome them Today we are here for the launch of the strategic plan Given our thrust to go into more the use of technology We are not going to be printing the strategic plan So we will be making it available on our website and we'll be emailing it to our Our development partners and to you later through the day So, um, the strategic plan is available. Just so you could see how it looks like right, so we have No, but similar content and our key feature um, our management team Will support this together And also our key feature would be our message from the chief So wait until later on this afternoon. We share with you so you'll be able to go through the document. Thank you Hi, good day everyone I would like to adopt the protocol that has already been established And it is my pleasure to present our website for the medium term development strategy So this as you can see would be the home page new two to some which is our theme When we go through the home page You can scroll down to see the key result areas for the medium term development strategy agriculture tourism infrastructure health education and citizen security Our projects also depict those initiatives You can also see our feedback the feedback to st. Lucia the mtds We also have a documentary. So when you scroll you will see a video that we've developed Um, I find it very efficient, you know, some persons don't want to read So if they can look at a video to get a grasp of what exactly we want to achieve in st. Lucia I think that's pretty good Our development pillars. So it just shows that we did not as our chief always says we were evidence based We looked at pillars in which we would you know spring from We looked at building productive capacity and expanding growth opportunities building strong institutions infrastructure connectivity adaptation for environmental sustainability climate change and disaster vulnerability Social transformation and the enhancing of the labor force through education trading and workforce development Of course health and wellness When you scroll down, you will be able to download the entire mtds documents which I've been hearing about Many persons are saying, okay, could you send me the mtds document? I want to assure you that this will not be placed on a shelf. It is in fact available for everyone Every solution deserves the right to know what exactly we are doing as a nation So you can download it here You move to our process if you would like information of how exactly was the mtds developed you can find information here To see that we did engage relevant stakeholders. So you can read about it on the website The development pillars as I mentioned, we did have a basis for what we were planning. We looked at, um Sorry Yes, we did have a basis. So we looked at what really was important to us to achieve as a country the sdgs We made sure that we did incorporate that in our strategy We focused on people planet prosperity peace and partnership And of course the mtds was sprung from those seven strategic development pillars Lastly you can see the key result areas So I know you've been hearing about the medium term development strategy our key result areas We chose six key results areas if you are not familiar with them again. It's agriculture tourism infrastructure So those represent the economic sector and we also wanted to make sure that we did include the social sector Sometimes it's left It's left hanging but we wanted to focus on health education and of course citizen security for agriculture to increase agricultural output by 36 percent and export for tourism to increase tourism arrivals For infrastructure to bridge to provide resilient infrastructure to support socioeconomic development For health increase the provision of affordable and quality health care for education to improve the quality of education and improve the educational pathways For citizen security to reduce the crime rate and improve the judicial system So that was our vision for the mtds This will be available to you the site will be launched shortly So everybody can have an idea as to what exactly we are we are striving for as a nation So again, I thank you Thank you stanza and when it's finally launched what will be the site the is it mtds dot Okay, so We will get a full layout and I guess we'll have a in terms of a press release on it. So the person's get to know Thank you very much for that no toot or some Okay, so we're drawing to a close very soon and to do that and to help us is Mrs. I heard miss PS you said or somebody told me you said miss is missus right mistress Right. Kerry Joseph Matthew Deputy chief economist and that's for national development. So let's welcome her Protocol having been established Ladies and gentlemen a pleasant good morning to you all Good afternoon I would like to start off by extending sincere gratitude To the staff and management of the department of economic development The consultant mrs. Betty combi key government and non-governmental entities and external partners for their contribution towards the development of this strategic plan As articulated earlier the purpose of the strategic plan is to provide needed clarity Direction and focus for the division of economic planning and national development In order to enhance operational efficiency and effectiveness Throughout the plans development. We carefully considered the feedback from our stakeholders and have integrated them into the new vision for the unit The new strategic plan will strike a good balance between our existing mandate and the desired vision for from our partners It will also aid in strengthening the department's responsiveness To the needs of the country as we seek to develop and implement programs and projects that will contribute to enhancing the socioeconomic living standards of citizens The COVID-19 pandemic has shown us the capabilities that we possess had been able to adapt and function in an unpredictable climate To use a quote from Franklin D. Roosevelt The only limit to our realization of tomorrow will be our doubts of today Our doubts or our self-limiting beliefs are the only restraints on the possibilities of the future Therefore this strategic plan represents for us our tomorrow Our ability to adapt and to be flexible in a changing and dynamic environment So as you leave here today think about this The accomplishment of great things never come from comfort zones but from hard work dedication to the job at hand And the determination that whether we win or lose We have applied the best of ourselves to the task at hand. I thank you Thank you very much This is Matthew It's the first time I'm mentioning your name as Matthew And the first time I've actually smelled like Clorox like this at any event, you know, it's Um, the new protocols are really getting you to feel real cleaner um This brings our event to a close. Let me thank the prime minister the minister for economic development ps chief economist and all the staff of The department department of finance as well, and I will especially invited guests. Thank you for your presence. Thanks to also the Media the GIS for carrying this event live so that all of St. Lucia could understand the important work that is happening and one of the biggest takeaways is that this will not be a document That just sits on a shelf that is great to hear but it will be implemented and so I say thank you and enjoy the rest of your day. Thank you very much We're out end here Okay, so I didn't want to say that part on on while we're alive, but refreshments are served I