Barbados a fiscal ‘role model’

GOVERNMENT’S controversial “fiscal tightening” has been working so well since late 2013 that it is now a “textbook demonstration” for other small countries facing economic adversity.

While the critics, including Opposition economic spokesman Dr Clyde Mascoll, continue to slam the austerity measures, including increased taxation, as ineffective, Central Bank Governor Dr DeLisle Worrell yesterday said it was one of Barbados’ “lessons to teach the world”.

He was speaking during the opening of the bank’s 35th Annual Review Seminar at Accra Beach Hotel.

The economist said Barbados did not have the time nor resources to operate like large industrial nations and that because its small size was not “curable” and its economy was “foreign exchange-constrained”, it had to “find an alternative policy mix which works around these constraints”.

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