UN General Assembly
2018

This year it has been a decade since the global economic and financial crisis manifested itself in 2008. We are greatly encouraged by reports from international development partners that global growth has improved and unemployment has declined to its lowest since the crisis. We are, however, mindful that among developing economies, including small island developing States such as mine, growth prospects are becoming more uneven. We remain vulnerable to a gamut of social, economic, environmental, financial and trade-related hazards, from within and beyond our borders. In that context, Jamaica’s quest to achieve inclusive and sustainable economic growth and meaningful job creation has encountered challenges. Ten years on, we still face the vagaries of an uncertain and at times volatile global economic environment. Together with persistent challenges linked to climate change and more frequent intense weather events, those problems all impact the pace of our development.