The Minister of Economic Affairs, Sen. Hon. Michael Halkitis spoke with ZNS News on the sidelines of a recent event about the Bahamian economy.
Halkitis said, “we had the unemployment status come out earlier this year showing unemployment down, fifteen year low. But we must continue to work because we must ensure that those benefits of a growing economy flow down straight throughout from the top to the bottom so that Bahamians actually feel it. So to the extent that you have groups not feeling it that means we have to continue to work.”
The Minister believes the economy will remain strong into next year. “Speaking with some of the hotel executives that are experiencing right now very, very high occupancy and have done so throughout the year. And so we want to promote the growth in the economy. As that economy grows we create more employment, more people are at work and so we see the budget position of the government continuing to improve.”
Halkitis further stated the government is monitored international affairs that can impact the economy, “the main one right now exercising our mind is that unrest Europe with the Ukraine war as well as the unrest in the middle east with the Israeli-Hamas war and the threat of those conflicts spreading and impacting things like oil prices. We believe we going to weather those, we have weathered them so far pretty well. We’ll continue to monitor those international developments but our key remains let’s grow the economy, let’s put more Bahamians to work and everything else will fall in place.”
