Following the announcement last week by the Statistical Institute of Jamaica that the local economy had declined by 2.3 per cent in the first quarter of 2020, compared to the corresponding period last year, two noted financiers shared their views as to the reasons for the decline.
Analyst Dennis Chung says the decline was not unexpected while Keith Duncan, head of the Jamaica Money Market Brokers Group and also president of the Private Sector Organisation of Jamaica, agreed.
“The decline is no surprise for the following reasons:
1. If you look at the quarterly trend the economy was already declining and would have found it difficult not to decline from last year’s first quarter (even without COVID-19), as I think the economy has a ceiling it can reach because of structural issues (eg not dealing with labour market reform).
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