United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Resident Representative in Jamaica, Minh Pham, has pledged to assist the government in the finalization and implementation of the country’s energy policy.

Speaking at the Petroleum Corporation of Jamaica’s (PCJ) Public Sector Energy Efficiency Seminar, staged in tandem with the UNDP, at the Knutsford Court Hotel in Kingston on Tuesday, March 18, 2008, Mr. Pham called for measures to be factored into the country’s national energy policy that will effectively address the impact of high fuel costs on the society’s poor and most vulnerable.

He noted that while fuel prices affected everyone, the poor and vulnerable are most affected. “I think it hurts a lot more for the bottom quintile of the Jamaica population,” he said.

The UNDP representative said that based on Jamaica’s average annual fuel consumption of nearly 30 million barrels of oil up to 2007, the country’s energy bill was expected to be nearly US$3 billion this year.

He noted that government expenditure on fuel, debt servicing, as well as the provision of social services, incorporating primarily health and education, as well as expenditure on security, placed a strain on the budgetary allocations.

Against that background, the UNDP has promised to support the implementation of the energy policy, particularly in areas pertaining to renewable energy alternatives.


SOURCE: Jamaica Information Service