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“[…] Please do not incur excessive debt to fulfil campaign promises or popular votes. Continuous deficit financing and public debt that balloons uncontrollably will undermine investor/lender confidence, reduce cash flow and impact generational wealth. Everybody must win.
“[…] Madame Prime Minister 2.0, it is clear that if T&T achieves its own food independence, this can reduce the food import bill and ease FX demand.
“I think that most farmers are mainly concerned with access roads, firearms to protect their livestock or crops, land security and a subsidy on chemicals and feed. I recommend land lease reform, where five- to ten-acre parcels be given to the registered/unregistered farmers and a contract be made based on production metrics…”
The following Letter to the Editor on considerations for a national budget that can drive Trinidad and Tobago’s development was submitted to Wired868 by Jairzinho Rigsby, a former UNC local government election candidate and ex-part-time UWI economics lecturer from Dundee Village, Arima:
Another financial year ends on 30 September 2025 for Trinidad and Tobago, and it is budget time, with every single citizen patiently waiting to win.
Budget time is also the time that the round table analysts, university scholars, media and commentators gather again to pontificate what should be done or should not be done to make T&T great again.
Photo: Chevaughn Christopher/ CA-images/ Wired868.
In speaking to reporters at last Friday’s parliamentary sitting, the Prime Minister indicated that T&T will incur another deficit given the wide gap between the country’s expenditure and revenue.
Please permit me so I can respond to the above statements and, at the same time, offer some ideas that the Honourable Prime Minister 2.0 could consider in this upcoming budget.
T&T has been running deficit budgets since fiscal 2009, with the exceptions of fiscal 2010 and 2022. With all due respect, Madam Prime Minister 2.0, while you were in opposition for 10 years, you would have been well aware of the declining financial health of T&T as members of the opposition.
Enough time to learn from the PNM’s economic mistakes. Therefore, you campaigned on the policies, plans and the intellectual capacity to fix T&T expeditiously if elected.
So why has there been such a delay in announcing the budget date? In fact, when the PNM took office on 15 September 2015, a budget was read by 05 October.
You also had UNC’s yearly budget consultations, so in my humble opinion, you had enough information and time to prepare the appropriation bill, seeing that everybody is waiting anxiously to win.
Photo: OPM.
Furthermore, unlike the PNM, please do not bore us with another five-hour-long budget speech that is really a campaign speech in the parliament.
With adjusted general government debt totalling TTD 140.5 billion, fiscal deficit of TTD 6,624.10 as at 31 December 2024, respectively, and adjusted general government debt accounting for 80 percent of GDP (Central Bank Data Centre), I humbly make some recommendations.
I recommend that you address policies that gradually reduce the fiscal deficit and public debt, while addressing the bread-and-butter issues such as reducing food prices, building materials, crime, and employment in the short term, while conducting research/development, and a robust recycling culture in the medium- to long-term.
(via TTPS.)
Please do not incur excessive debt to fulfil campaign promises or popular votes. Continuous deficit financing and public debt that balloons uncontrollably will undermine investor/lender confidence, reduce cash flow and impact generational wealth. Everybody must win.
Madame Prime Minister 2.0, it is clear that if T&T achieves its own food independence, this can reduce the food import bill and ease FX demand.
I think that most farmers are mainly concerned with access roads, firearms to protect their livestock or crops, land security and a subsidy on chemicals and feed. I recommend land lease reform, where five- to ten-acre parcels be given to the registered/unregistered farmers and a contract be made based on production metrics.
(Copyright Office of the President.)
If not met, another farmer will be given the chance.
Firearms can be approved for qualified farmers in their respective areas, and they can undertake patrols with one assigned police officer for supervision.
The government can subsidise expensive chemicals/feed so that smaller farmers can pay their bills and still be financially sustainable.
Finally, medium- to long-term initiatives can look at state-assisted greenhouse farming for the rainy season and research into developments for all-year-round crops, such as lemons, avocados, oranges, etc.
Copyright: Office of Parliament 2025.
In my humble opinion, programmes such as Cepep/URP and employment schemes under local corporations, Wasa, state boards and HDC were created theoretically with good intentions but were ultimately voting and party loyalist banks.
These arrangements, corrupted by party politics, have left 30,000–40,000 people unemployed, such is the citizens’ burden of party politics—but is shutting them down, citing corruption issues, good “politics”?
I do hope perpetrators will be brought to justice.
Photo: Cepep.
Under your new Cepep/ URP 2.0, I suggest a forensic auditing team be hired from the private sector, consisting of accountants, attorneys, risk/compliance, finance and people with strong management skills, to audit these programmes, as well as the corporations, every quarter, thus taking the load off the Auditor General’s Department.
Finally, Madam Prime Minister 2.0, I recommend that research/development funds, as a small percentage of GDP, be made available to improve problem-solving and creativity among the population.
Innovation is crucial in competing globally. We need to chart a vision for T&T. Jamaica has declared itself a Stem (science, technology, engineering, and mathematics) island to foster innovation and drive economic growth.
Estonia has named itself E-Estonia; this is a leading country in E-technologies/ICT since 2000, with a focus on the Healthcare 4.0 model. Even US President Donald Trump held a dinner with the country’s tech giants to forge innovation to build economic growth.
In T&T, who are the tech titans that the government will call to innovate T&T? The Business Chambers or themselves?
In closing, investments in innovation, modernisation reforms, reducing state dependency, and honest and agile leadership will allow Trinidad and Tobago to slowly rebound.
Photo: UNC.
Madam Prime Minister 2.0, don’t fight the business sector, or the “one percent”—partner with them. So, I hope to win with this budget.
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All pie in the sky talk. The song has been sung so many times for so many years. Nothing innovative in this. It’s the attitude and will of the citizens and sadly I don’t think it’s there and will ever be. The UNC has and already proven that they are corrupt to the core. Look at who they replace experienced and qualified people with. Friends, family and sycophants, most we know of their corrupt ways. Important and critical businesses which were run by well vetted individuals, some of whom were foreigners that had no link to the local politics but were selected solely on their qualifications.were arbitrarily dismissed. You have a PM and ministers creating policies on the fly with international diplomacy in the sewer, no consistent cabinet meetings and therefore nothing to report. It’s a disaster at a critical time when the country needs prudent management.