Govt
weighs gas subsidy
PORT SPAIN
Petroleumworldtt.com
03 02 08
GOVERNMENT IS still reviewing whether or not to
remove gas subsidy, Minister in the Ministry of
Finance, Mariano Browne said yesterday.
Several economic analysts have called for the
removal of the billion dollar subsidy, leaving
drivers to foot their fuel bills, rather than being
subsidised. It may also assist with the traffic
gridlock, they have said.
“Dealing with the traffic issue is a multi-disciplinary
problem. It has to be attacked from several angles.
We have to explore all our options and looking
at the gas subsidy is one of those views,” Browne
told reporters after delivering the feature address
at the launch of the Junior Achievement Titan competition
at Crowne Plaza, Port-of-Spain.
“You can’t build new roads to put
more cars. You can build cars faster than you can
build roads,” he added.
Commenting on the country’s
lagging global competitiveness index ranking,
Browne said the
decline was due to the personal response segment.
“The global competitive index
has several perspectives. It has some economic
perspectives,
anecdotal perspectives, they do some measurements
and they also do interviews, asking people for
responses.”
He said that in many of the core areas, such as
the performance of the economy, TT performed well.
“The difficulty was in terms
of the off-the-cuff responses, the subjective
responses and those are
business confidence issues we have to treat with.
Story
by Roxane Stapleton -Whyms from Trinidad & Tobago
Newsday
Trinidad & Tobago Newsday
Thursday, February 28
2008
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