A team of specialists from the International Finance Corporation (IFC) of the World Bank Group, earlier today, met with Minister of Public Health, Volda Lawrence to gather information deemed critical to the development of a Systematic Country Diagnostic (SCD) for Guyana.
This is in keeping with the World Bank’s 2030 goals of an end to extreme poverty and the promotion of shared prosperity in every country. Recognizing the importance of public health in any country’s development, the team of specialists engaged Minister Lawrence on matters pertaining to the sector.
Senior Economist of the World Bank Group for Latin America and the Caribbean, Johannes (Han) Herderschee explained that the initial meeting with the minister is to discuss the SCD and to ensure that systems related to public health are taken into consideration.
“An SCD sets out what are the constraints in what we call inclusive growth, that’s growth which includes a broad section of society and the bottom 40 percent of the people. It also allows for the design policies and support that could better benefit (the country) and of course, health is an important factor of these discussions,” Herderschee explained.
Minister Lawrence, in a brief comment, indicated that while the World Bank team is looking at challenges in the health sector, there is the hope of technical assistance being provided.
She said, “I trust that after this deliberation we will be able to have some assistance, technical assistance. You know, one of our top priorities in terms of our challenges is human resources and retaining those human resources at the highest level.”
The SCD is intended to become a reference point for client consultations on priorities for World Bank Group country engagement. As of June 30, 2014, SCDs are required prior to sending a Country Partnership Framework (CPF) to the Board.
IFC is a sister organization of the World Bank and is the largest global development institution.
