FUTURE ISSUES

For the future GOJ faces two main issues. Firstly, a relatively high national debt means the GOJ has limited capacity to service loan commitments arising from these collaborative initiatives with international development partners. Even though a portion of the funds is given as grants, the significant portion of the budget needed to implement the initiative represents a loan. It is not unusual for developing countries to fund economic development with debts but in the case of Jamaica where the national debt is 131.48% of GDP in 2006, this will become an issue. The second main issue is the deployment of ICT to rural communities. Again this is a situation faced by other developing countries and can be more problematic for some more than others. For example, in the case of India and China where large and widely dispersed populations are two factors that contribute to the digital divide between urban and rural areas. While these factors may be less problematic for Jamaica, there are still issues especially regarding access to and use of the Internet. These manifest in problems of infrastructure, ICT education, and personal financial constraints. GOJ will start to address this broad issue through the e-learning project, which will provide community access points, and the Wifi and WiMax policy initiatives. These are positive moves but the limitation on committed resources and the setbacks associated with stakeholders' participation mean that the issue of the digital divide is likely to be longstanding.