United Nations Development Programme Jamaica

Overview

Jamaica has made notable progress in poverty reduction and is ranked an upper middle-income country. However, recent global food, fuel and financial crises, and the high levels of national debt threaten to exacerbate Jamaica's economic difficulties and reverse the progress made thus far.

UNDP’s Poverty Reduction Programme seeks to impact human development in Jamaica by improving the economic, social and environmental conditions of poor people. We support reducing inequalities in wealth distribution and expanding people’s choices. To this end UNDP has supported initiatives at both the macro and micro levels.

At macro level, UNDP has assisted the Government of Jamaica to strengthen its debt management by helping to facilitate the Jamaica Debt Exchange (JDX), among other things. UNDP’s technical assistance includes strengthening fiscal and other public policies, such as developing processes towards more equitable and effective tax policy.

UNDP has made significant contributions toward the development of a national statistical system and the development of indicators and targets for the National Development Plan, Vision 2030. This is part of a wider movement towards increased use of data for effective policy making.

At micro level, UNDP is helping to improve the capacity of the Department of Correctional Services to provide a safe, secure and caring environment for young people on remand, and to aid with their reintegration into society by providing them with life and vocational skills.

UNDP’s Rural Youth Employment Project has attracted significant interest and achieved immediate, success in enabling rural youth to improve their life chances and income earning capabilities through agricultural and agro-processing enterprises.

UNDP making a difference

The UNDP Poverty Reduction Unit works with government partners, civil society, private sector, academia, other United Nations agencies and international development partners to achieve key goals.

Key Goal

UNDP is committed to:

1. Creating a stronger population identification, and monitoring and evaluation framework so that development actors are better informed about target populations and the impact of development interventions, for example - where they are, what their needs are, what impacts their lives, and how best to assist them
2. Identifying and assisting the government in designing solutions to strengthen the social protection systems/social safety net, and providing adequate social services
3. Utilizing the latent potential of the agricultural sector as an engine of growth for both national income and employment/poverty reduction, particularly in rural areas
4. Minimizing constraints on micro, small and medium enterprise sectors particularly along the agricultural/agro-processing value chain

Poverty Reduction in the News>

Initiatives

Improved national capacity to implement evidence-based policies

We are supporting the Government of Jamaica to strengthen data collection, analysis, storage and dissemination systems to help them make informed policies and decisions. We are assisting them to create a coordinated approach to producing national statistics to achieve consistency, efficiency, transparency and compatibility with international standards and among national agencies.

We support monitoring and communicating progress towards achieving the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) and Vision 2030.

Inclusive growth and Millennium Development Goals Achievement

UNDP also assists Jamaica to strengthen its fiscal management policy making capacity. We strengthen national capacity to achieve equitable growth through improved systems to track progress on human development targets such as the MDGs, the Jamaica-National Development Plan Vision 2030 and Jamaica’s Medium-Term Socio-Economic Policy Framework.

Prosperity and Wealth Generation

UNDP is working to improve the life chances and income earning capabilities of rural youth through agricultural and agro-processing enterprises. UNDP strengthens local government capacity to address youth unemployment and promote sustainable economic growth in rural areas.

Current Projects

Start Date	Project ID Code	Title	Status	Project Document
2011	00080723	Support to Metcalfe Project	Ongoing
2010	00074246	Rural Youth Employment Project	Ongoing
2009	00046228	Support for the Development of a National Statistics System	Ongoing
2008	00063208	Strategic Flexible Funding	Ongoing
2007	00054928	Support to National Development Planning Goals, MDGs and Human Development	Ongoing

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