Call to speed up SOEs reform

Government is being urged to urgently accelerate its reform of state-owned enterprises (SOEs).

That is the advice of the Barbados Economic Recovery and Transformation Plan (BERT) Monitoring Committee, which has flagged an increase in Government funding to these statutory entities at a time when they are supposed to be made more efficient and less dependent on such assistance.

The BERT Monitoring Committee raised concerns about SOEs yesterday in its 13th public report.

“As expenditure has increased significantly over the past year with the response to the triple shocks of the ongoing pandemic and two natural disasters, it is more important than ever that the anticipated reforms to the SOEs are progressed,” the economic reform watchdog said.

“The financial support to SOEs continues to rise steadily. [It] reached $416 million for the first three fiscal quarters of 2021/22 versus $366 million and $392 million in the same period of the prior two years.”  (SC)

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