The Gambian leader has announced that the major target of his government’s Vision 2016 food self-sufficiency agenda is to bring a 99% direct benefit to Gambians from the country’s endowed natural resources.

To make this target attainable, President Jammeh reminded the young people about their responsibilities and to be ready to work harder.

His Excellency Sheikh Professor Alhaji Dr Yahya Jammeh made these remarks on Tuesday at the Cannan Technical Institute in Brikama as part of his nationwide agricultural tour in the context of his 2013-launched Vision 2016 food self-sufficiency agenda.

President Jammeh equally called on Gambians to love and stand for one another, saying the people must maintain the brother and sisterly relations that bind them together. “It is in The Gambia where you will see a Gambian helping a foreigner and deny his or her fellow Gambian,” he said.

He further told the gathering that since 1994, he has been calling on every Gambian to plant at least one fruit tree every year; a call he said, was answered by very few people.

The President further announced that in addition to his ‘Eat what you grow and grow what you eat’ slogan of the Vision 2016 agenda, the slogan for communities in the Kombo will focus on the marine sector; ‘Eat the fish you catch and catch the fish you eat’ will be used to encourage the people in Kombo, particularly the young people to exploit the marine resources.

He indicated that meat and fish are costly in the country today because the business is predominated by foreigners.

He also lamented the hiking of prices of commodities by business people during the holy month of Ramadan, saying Muslims themselves predominantly make this act.

Naming of roads

At the Brikama meeting, President Jammeh announced the naming of new roads after prominent Gambian for their efforts in the development of the country and their loyalty to the President and the APRC party since 1994, as part of Gambia’s 50th independence anniversary celebration.

The Brikama-Gunjur Road was named after Amadou Samba, the Brikama-Busura Road was named after Alhagie Musa Babadinding Ceesay, Brikama-Sanyang road was named after the late Seyfo Eric Tunde Janneh, Brikama-Darsilami raod was named after Dembo Keleng Bojang and the Mandinaba-Soma toad was named after the late Jamil Ali Farage.

President Jammeh said Samba, Ceesay and the Late Farage are genuine Gambians who are today reaping the benefit of the hard work they did towards the country’s development.

He finally advised: “We must all understand that Islam is very clear and no one can fool Allah. If you don’t worship Allah, then you will worship Saitan.”

Bala Garba Jahumpa, minister of Works, Construction and infrastructure, said President Jammeh’s ultimate aim is to develop the entire country, saying the Vision 2016 agenda targets to revolutionalise agriculture in the country where the people will benefit from their sweat.

According to him, for 32 good years, roads ranging from Brikama, Gunjur to Busura, the Kombo Coastal, Mandinaba-Soma and Seliti roads were all in dilapidated conditions but with the coming of President Jammeh-led government, they have all been constructed and transformed into first class roads.

“We have to all understand that politics does not call for being a Jola, Mandinka, Wolof or Fula but it is a tool for development,” he said.

Dembo Keleng Bojang, chief of Kombo Central and Alasana Bojang, National Assembly member of Kombo East constituency both commended President Jammeh for coming up with the Vision 2016 initiative, which they said will help Gambians to benefit from their endowed resources.

Amadou Samba and Alhagie Musa Babadinding Ceesay, the two who were named after the Brikama-Gunjur Road and the Brikama-Busura Road both commended the Gambian leader for the honour. “My family and I are grateful to the honour and we assure that we will always stand to support you,” Amadou Samba said.

“President Jammeh is a leader who always reciprocates people’s good deeds accordingly,” said Alhagie Musa Babadinding Ceesay.

Alhagie Lie Jarju, alkalo of Brikama Daru Hairu and Tabali Bojang, the Kombo Central APRC chairman commended the Gambian leader for the initiative.

The Gambian economy requires strong corrective actions and comprehensive reforms to neutralise its current challenges and set it on a path to sustainable higher growth rate, the International Monetary Fund has said in a report.
The IMF Country Report on The Gambia, which x-rayed the country’s economy based on different indicators, states that “extended period of poor economic performance has left The Gambia facing serious economic difficulties”.

The report noted that the government’s public debt had risen to 100 per cent of the country’s total gross domestic product (GDP) by end-2014.

The continuous domestic borrowing by government has almost drained the banks of the needed resources to extend credit to the private sector for development purposes.

However, the IMF pointed out that The Gambia government’s heavy borrowing is not only for use by the central government but also its loss-making public institutions like the national electricity and water provider, Nawec, and the national telecommunications giants, Gamtel and Gamcel.

The budget support disbursements that were withheld by multilateral institutions and “some other factors” also contributed to pushing up the government’s net domestic borrowing, according to the IMF.

At the moment, not only did the commercial banks have little resources to give credit to the private sector, they “have very limited resources to meet the government’s financing needs,” the IMF country report said.

The rationale behind this is that “the Central Bank of The Gambia (CBG) has maintained reserve requirements at elevated levels, while increasing the policy rate to 22 per cent”.

Economy decline

The IMF report stated that The Gambia’s real GDP is now estimated to have declined by ¼ per cent in 2014 due to the lost tourism receipts and crops.

“With tourism receipts continuing to be negatively affected [by the Ebola outbreak in the sub-region] in the first part of 2015, even under the best-case scenario, the 2015 recovery will be dampened,” the report says.

However, if the regional Ebola outbreak is brought under control by the third quarter of 2015, Gambia’s real GDP is expected to grow by about 5 per cent in 2015 driven by the recovery of agriculture.

Even though neighbouring countries are also reporting a substantial impact on their tourism sectors due to the Ebola outbreak, the impact on The Gambia’s is more severe since tourism provides a much larger contribution to the country’s foreign exchange earnings.

The IMF report pointed out that due to the slump in tourism and fiscal slippages, at end-2014 the level of Gambia’s gross international reserves declined to 4 months of import cover.

The reduction of the reserves indicates that government’s ability to pay for imports and service debts to foreign creditors has reduced and it makes the country more volatile to external shocks.

Inflation increases

The report on The Gambia also noted that the annual inflation rate picked up from 5.5 per cent until August to 7 per cent by January 2015 due to the exchange rate depreciation and the food supply shock.

Corrective measures

“Addressing these problems will require strong policy adjustment and significant levels of external assistance,” the report said, adding:“In the absence of strong corrective actions by the authorities, The Gambia would risk undergoing a forced adjustment.”

The IMF said that since half of the government’s debt is from domestic sources, interest payments accounts for more than one third of the country’s revenue in 2015.

The institution warned that in the absence of corrective actions, it is projected that the domestic borrowing in 2015 would crowd out completely room for private credit, the public debt to GDP ratio would edge up further to 105 per cent by year-end, and the gross reserves’ import coverage would decline to about 3¼ months.

“These developments would escalate substantially the rollover risks of domestic public debt and push it onto an unsustainable path, increasing significantly the risk of a loss of confidence in the currency as international reserves fall to an uncomfortable level, and potentially triggering a banking crisis given the elevated level of commercial banks’ exposure to government debt,” the IMF said.

“Such a scenario would have long lasting economic repercussions and drastic corrective policies would be required to address such problems.”

Source: The Point

The chief executive officer (CEO) of The Gambia Investment and Exports Promotion Agency (GIEPA) has assured her institution’s committment to support the business community and institutions to make positive difference in peoples’ live.

Presenting the institution’s activity report for the year ended 2013 before deputies of the joint session of the Public Accounts and Public Enterprises Committees (PAC/PEC) of the National Assembly on Wednesday, Fatou Mbenga-Jallow, outlined GIEPA’s corporate responsibility, while assuring that GIEPA is equally committed to support communities which work and live and are consistently looking for ways to provide support and encouragement to the business community and the environment it operates.

“In 2013, the Agency supported many initiatives, their objective mainly is to gain maximum exposure to doing business outside of The Gambia,” she revealed.

During the scrutiny session, the GIEPA boss pointed out that the Agency wanted an increase in its annual subvention so as to render more services. “We are doing a great job, but we can do more if there is more resources,” she assured lawmakers.

The GIEPA CEO informed lawmakers that during the past few years, the Agency had also put some funds in its public relations budget to support businesses fund their travels to trade fairs and other event where they would be exposed to business opportunities.

Madam Mbenga-Jallow said that the Agency continues to set examples of how such businesses can be supported, while urging the private sector to step up and do the same. She disclosed: “The Agency supported other institutions by contributing to their social events and worthy causes and such includes staff social welfares, charitable donations and government fund raising events.”

On project profiles, the GIEPA boss went on, as part of government’s PAGE, the Gambia has identified several priorities sectors including Fisheries and Information Communication Technology (ICT) as potential drivers of the economic growth development in the coming years.

CEO Madam Mbenga-Jallow assured deputies that GIEPA would lead this facilitation of a consultancy, which she said will profile both sectors toward developing 10 to 15 specific project profiles to be promoted to the targeted investors in those sectors.

Dilating on the private sector development strategy, the CEO further assured that GIEPA would lead efforts of developing a private sector development strategy for The Gambia through the support of The GCP.

“The development of the strategy will be coordinated between the Ministry of Trade, GIEPA and The Gambia Chamber of Commerce and Industry,” she informed.

She further assured lawmakers that GIEPA would focus on promoting and developing the export potential of businesses in the country. The national export strategy, she noted, has been prepared and agreed. She added that priority sectors for export promotion are already defined.

GIEPA was rated by The Gambia Public Procurement Authority (GPPA) for 97% compliance on both their activity and financial reports and was adopted by deputies with unanimous vote.

Source: Daily Observer