USD 100 million to Mitigate Economic Impact of COVID-19 in Barbados

CAF—development bank of Latin America—approved a USD 100 million loan to Barbados to support the government’s fiscal management to mitigate the effects of COVID-19 on the economic, financial and social sectors, as well as on people’s quality of life.

These funds will help promote the timely availability and implementation of public resources to address the economic and social impacts of the pandemic in Barbados.

“With these financial resources, we hope to strengthen the countercyclical effect of fiscal policy through the temporary implementation of measures to protect the income of vulnerable households and to increase the liquidity of businesses and protect jobs during the healthcare and economic crisis,” said CAF executive president Luis Carranza Ugarte.

In the last five years (2015–2019), CAF approved operations in favor of Barbados for USD 112 million, for an average of USD 22 million per year. In the same period, total disbursements amounted to USD 96 million, for an annual average of USD 19 million.

To cope with the effects of the pandemic in Latin America, CAF offered in early March a regional credit line of USD 50 million per country to address the health emergency, a USD 400,000 grant, and a USD 2.5 billion regional emergency credit line to bolster countercyclical economic measures.