By Makutu Manneh
A Recovery-Focused National Development Plan has been launched by President Adama Barrow on Friday, 10 February 2024, as a way of encouraging local resource mobilisation.
According to the president, ‘‘the best way to develop our country is to improve and strengthen domestic recourse mobilization,” as he called on the tax office of the country to intensify, improve and strengthen the nation’s domestic resource mobilisation drive.
The president promised that his government will enhance domestic resource mobilisation to harness the strength of government’s financial capacity and to ensure that the country’s development journey is anchored on self-reliance.
The RF-NDP, which has been named “YIRIWAA” meaning ‘development’ in one of the national languages, is the successor of the 2018-2021 National Development Plan (NDP) and the second Plan under President Barrow’s leadership. According to the president, the goal of the new plan is to consolidate the gains of democratic governance and to accelerate the ‘green’ economy for social transformation, and building resilience to shocks and crises. He said the implementation of the plan is organised around seven pillars and further informed the people that ‘YIRIWAA’ plan comes along with a financial strategy which presents an optimistic funding scenario of 3.5 billion US Dollars, alongside a conservative framework of 2.8 billion US Dollars.
“The optimistic scenario assumes that resources will be available to implement all priority areas of the plan while the other scenario assumes that resources will be available to implement only the top priorities of the plan,” the President said.
He continued: “To address the funding requirements, my government will explore a three pronged financing strategy in domestic resource mobilization, innovative and concessionary financing.”
He said all these are geared towards promoting green investment and sustainable development.
President Barrow called on Gambians to embrace the plan as theirs, saying “together, let us translate our shared vision into action to realise all the ‘YIRIWAA’ goals and targets”.
Seedy Kieta, the Minister of Finance and Economic Affairs, said the formulation of the ‘YIRIWAA’ plan comes at a time when countries around the world are still recovering from the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic and the effect of the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war.
“As a medium term development plan, it will help address these and other development challenges being encountered with a view to achieve the development aspirations of our citizens,” he said.
Minister Keita adds that the new plan is the vehicle through which they would define the strategies to address the prevailing socio-economic development challenges. He said the successful implementation of the plan would ensure the achievement of the country’s medium term development objectives and will contribute to the realisation of the country’s global and regional commitment.
