Gambia’s debt at over D10, 000 million Halifa Sallah discloses to National Assembly The National Assembly has been told that The Gambia’s debt, which was described as huge last year has peaked to a tune of over ten thousand, three hundred million dalasi (D10, 300, 000000). Making the revelation Halifa Sallah the member for Serekunda Central stated that out of the amount, four hundred and eighty-two million dalasis has been spent on the import of agricultural commodities which is equivalent to 30 percent of the country’s gross domestic product (GDP). He added that despite agriculture being the mainstay of the country’s economy, Gambians are yet to be self-sufficient in food as 42 percent of imports is on food, which can be produced in the country. Honourable Sallah further noted that although President Jammeh in his speech to the National Assembly last week raised the issue of making the country a manufacturing and exporting nation, yet no appraisal was made of the country’s industrial potentials, which at the moment is only contributing 11 percent of the GDP. He added that he would have expected the president to tell the Gambian people about the state of the former GPMB hence according to him there must be a strong linkage between agriculture and processing in order to reduce the import bill and increase the export bill so as to enable the country become an export-oriented and manufacturing nation. He added that although the government plans to make a private sector led economy, if the necessary conditions are not in place there would be neither private sector nor public sector development, which might result in institutional accumulation. He also pointed out that the banking system was expected to encourage investment in the production base of the economy but in recent times, the banking system is not seriously involved in the productive base of the economy notably in industry and agriculture. He noted that the current problems of high interest rates being encountered by the banking system has rendered it difficult to borrow money. He observed therefore that there are indicators that the reserves of the banking system is going down by 30.7 percent whiles the Central Bank’s external reserve has declined by 12.1 percent due to high interest rates and debt. Halifa stressed that the country’s debt is increasing, making it imperative to examine The Gambia’s economic realities when initiating projects. Also deliberating on the motion, Edrissa Samba Sallah member for Sami called on government to implement the irrigated rice development project in CRD North funded by the Kuwaiti government at a tune of 307 million US Dollars. He also called on the government to put up processing plants and storage facilities for vegetable gardeners. Mr. Sallah further appealed to the government to provide ambulances to major health centres in the provinces, where he said great difficulties are encountered in transferring patients to referral hospitals. Meanwhile a one minute silence in the National Assembly was observed for the late Fabakary Cham member for Kombo North Constituency who died last week. Cherno Jallow resigns as GPU S _________________________________________________________________ Get your FREE download of MSN Explorer at http://explorer.msn.com/intl.asp. <<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>> To view archives of postings, go to the Gambia-L Web interface at: http://maelstrom.stjohns.edu/archives/gambia-l.html To contact the List Management, please send an e-mail to: [log in to unmask] <<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>//\\<<//\\>>