Fifty years after its conception, the Planning Institute of Jamaica is still working to promote national development while courting foreign investment.

The Planning Institute of Jamaica (PIOJ) celebrated its 50th anniversary last year. Established in 1955 as the central planning unit, the agency’s role was to act as a guide to the newly independent state and assist in its transition from a colony to independence. As such, the agency has been around for nearly as long as Jamaica’s statehood and has accompanied the country throughout nearly every step of its existence. According to Director General Dr. Wesley Hughes, the original mission of the then central planning unit was to “understand, measure, research and find data about the Jamaican economy and society, and to present proposals and policy ideas to the government.” In short, the agency’s role was to help teach Jamaica about itself.

“Essentially we did not know much. We were a British colony, and there was information, but most of it was for the colonial office in London,” he explains. Consequently, the central planning unit began a tradition that carries on today: the publication of an annual development report entitled the Economic and Social Survey of Jamaica. In 1972, the unit was renamed the National Planning Agency, and in 1984, it became the Planning Institute of Jamaica (PIOJ)

DR. WESLEY HUGHES PIOJ Director General

PIOJ has played an instrumental role in the development of the country and it has in fact fulfilled for itself one of the main duties it was originally called on to carry out for the government – it has come to know Jamaica. The process has been trial and error, according to Dr. Hughes, who says that the agency’s first great successes came about in the industrial boom of the 1950s and 1960s, but they came at the cost of the island’s rural communities and agricultural sector. He explains, “We made significant progress in terms of investment in those days, using the import substitution model. We built up a lot of small scale manufacturing industries and growth rates were high. It was a period of tremendous excitement because we were getting large investments.” However, these industries lured workers to urban areas and the government began subsidizing food imports so that plant workers could afford to feed themselves cheaply. This decimated domestic agriculture, according to Dr. Hughes, as people ate imported rice and other products, and consumption habits changed, contributing to a decline in agriculture and even higher levels of urban migration. He adds, “It was the unintentional consequence of a public policy designed to accelerate growth.”

PIOJ has played an instrumental role in the development of the country - it has come to know Jamaica

The following 20 years brought globalization and increased competition, and although the government fought hard to keep its industries through subsidization, it eventually realized that this policy was not sustainable in the long-term. Today, few of those industries are still operating, but the experience helped PIOJ evolve and create a new model of development which Dr. Hughes calls “organic”. The new model relies more on the private sector and focuses on a government that sets up the infrastructure for private sector growth. This has prepared the country for the new growth it is now experiencing. “PIOJ,” states Dr. Hughes, “has the ability to analyze the problems of development with hindsight and possible foresight in a very profound way. Our main achievement is having devised an approach to economic management and economic planning that has, in a sense, put us in the position to achieve the take-off that I think we are beginning to see the incipient stages of – with significant investment flows that we have not seen since the early 60s.” Looking forward, Dr. Hughes says the government will now work towards the redevelopment of Kingston, and continue with major infrastructure projects such as Highway 2000. This project is the centerpiece of the Millennium projects program launched in 1999 - the highway will connect the capital, Kingston, with Montego Bay and Ocho Rios on the North coast of the island.