Dr. Wesley Hughes, director general, Planning Institute of Jamaica. - File

Sabrina Gordon, Business Reporter

The Planning Institute of Jamaica is developing a new long-term strategic plan with a 25-year horizon, which, according to the agency's boss, Dr. Wesley Hughes, is meant to reclassify Jamaica among the world's rich countries.

"PIOJ has been given the mandate to formulate a national development plan which will put Jamaica in a position to achieve developed country status by 2030," said Hughes at a consultative forum with the media on Thursday.

The purpose of the forum was to explain and 'engage' the media in the new 'Threshold 21- Jamaica Integrated Model, (the T21), a tool to establish the parameters on which the development plan would be crafted.

The project cost, $244.7 million, is being funded by the Caribbean Development Bank, according to information contained in the Budget.

Jamaica's planning horizons, in the past, have been contained to five-year terms, sometimes 10, to coincide with changes of political administrations. Under that framework, policies and programmes changed along with the party in power, with little room for continuity.

"The plan was for the government of the day; once the government changed, the plan disappeared," said Hughes.

But "we want to do better, and can do better," he insisted.

Under the T21, Jamaica will be able to predict the results of various policy strategies related to growth and development in different sectors. It is intended to aid in policy decision making by predicting the consequences of different strategies across a range of variables, taking economic, social and environmental factors into account in the analysis.

As perceived by Hughes, Jamaica would need to experience economic growth of seven per cent per annum on average to reach developed status in the quarter century.

"I know this is a tall order, but we have done it before, in 1960-65," he said. "It is not outside the scope of possibility."

The model will make assumptions as to how to allocate money over various economic sectors, and trade-offs required, to meet the growth target.

Hughes did not spell out fully what other targets the country should be shooting for, but indicated that some of those assessments would follow the consultations under way.

Cabinet approved

Cabinet has already approved his programme: the T21 to be developed by July 2007, and by April 2008 to draft and deliver the new NDP-25.

Jamaica is currently classified as a lower middle-income developing country.

Its per capita income, one of the measures of economic development, was recorded at US$3,657 in 2005. Compared, Barbados was triple its position at US$11,088.

Hughes' new plan will examine the needs and set performance targets for each sector of the economy.

The purposed 'vision', he said, is to make "Jamaica the place of choice to raise families, live, work and do business" while preserving its citizens rights and freedoms.

The guiding principle behind the transformation process outlined by Hughes, Jamaica's chief planner, involves people at the heart of development - providing for equal opportunity to economic mobility - and directed by strong leadership in the decision-making process.

"We cannot have sustainability if social groups are excluded, however small the minority," said Hughes.

sabrina.gordon@gleanerjm.com