In a ceremony at the Ministry of Works\u2019 conference room on Friday, the United States and\u00a0 Grenada signed an agreement to consolidate and reschedule certain debts owed to the\u00a0 United States to support the Government of Grenada to devote those resources to increase\u00a0 social, health, and economic spending in response to the COVID-19 crisis.<\/p>\n
Once in force, the agreement defers until 2022-24 the payment of more than $320,000 in\u00a0 principal and interest due between May and December 2020 so that Grenada can focus on\u00a0 immediate pandemic needs. The agreement implements the terms of the Paris Club-G20\u00a0 Debt Service Suspension Initiative, of which Grenada is a beneficiary.<\/p>\n
Minister for Finance Gregory Bowen and U.S. Embassy Grenada Charg\u00e9 d\u2019 Affaires Karl\u00a0 Duckworth signed the agreement.<\/p>\n
\u201cGrenada is deeply appreciative of the move by the United States to defer the amounts\u00a0 owed to that country. We commend their responsiveness to the Debt Service Suspension\u00a0 Initiative which is crucial to the efforts by our country to redirect resources to mounting an\u00a0 effective response to the COVID-19 pandemic and to fostering the early stages of\u00a0 recovery. The effectiveness of our efforts thus far is due in large part to the relief granted\u00a0 through this debt service arrangement,\u201d Minister Bowen said.<\/p>\n
\u201cAt a time when so many in Grenada are impacted by the economic effects of COVID-19,\u00a0 the United States renews its commitment to Grenada and its people,\u201d said Duckworth.\u00a0 \u201cI\u2019ve seen firsthand how the diminished number of tourists and students, along with the\u00a0 new COVID cluster, has affected the lives of Grenadians.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe United States is leading the effort to combat COVID-19 and its threat to global\u00a0 health and security,\u201d added Duckworth. \u201cAddressing debt transparency and sustainability\u00a0 is a priority for the United States to enable the long-term financial stability of Grenada and\u00a0 other countries as they face the difficult choice of servicing debt or responding to urgent\u00a0 health and economic needs.\u201d<\/p>\n
In April 2020, the United States helped lead the G20\u2019s efforts to establish the Debt Service\u00a0 Suspension Initiative, which provides a suspension on official bilateral debt service\u00a0 payments by low-income countries so they can channel savings toward COVID-19\u00a0 responses. This initiative is creating tangible, rapid benefits for the world\u2019s countries that\u00a0 need it most.<\/p>\n
The Paris Club was formed in 1956 and is an informal group of official creditors whose\u00a0 role is to find coordinated and sustainable solutions to the payment difficulties experienced\u00a0 by borrower countries.<\/p>\n
The members of the Paris Club are the governments of Australia, Austria, Belgium, Brazil,\u00a0 Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Japan, the Netherlands,\u00a0 Norway, the Republic of Korea, the Russian Federation, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, the\u00a0 United Kingdom and the United States of America.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In a ceremony at the Ministry of Works\u2019 conference room on Friday, the United States and\u00a0 Grenada signed an agreement to consolidate and reschedule certain debts owed to the\u00a0 United States to support the Government […]<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":7745,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2,39],"tags":[180],"class_list":{"0":"post-7744","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-government-news","8":"category-local-news","9":"tag-language"},"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/drealfmgrenada.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/131356185_832069707582911_5831691780190067044_n.jpg?fit=1242%2C931&ssl=1","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"rttpg_featured_image_url":{"full":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/drealfmgrenada.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/131356185_832069707582911_5831691780190067044_n.jpg?fit=1242%2C931&ssl=1",1242,931,false],"landscape":["https:\/\/drealfmgrenada.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/131356185_832069707582911_5831691780190067044_n.jpg",1242,931,false],"portraits":["https:\/\/drealfmgrenada.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/131356185_832069707582911_5831691780190067044_n.jpg",1242,931,false],"thumbnail":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/drealfmgrenada.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/131356185_832069707582911_5831691780190067044_n.jpg?resize=150%2C150&ssl=1",150,150,true],"medium":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/drealfmgrenada.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/131356185_832069707582911_5831691780190067044_n.jpg?fit=300%2C225&ssl=1",300,225,true],"large":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/drealfmgrenada.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/131356185_832069707582911_5831691780190067044_n.jpg?fit=1024%2C768&ssl=1",1024,768,true],"1536x1536":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/drealfmgrenada.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/131356185_832069707582911_5831691780190067044_n.jpg?fit=1242%2C931&ssl=1",1242,931,true],"2048x2048":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/drealfmgrenada.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/131356185_832069707582911_5831691780190067044_n.jpg?fit=1242%2C931&ssl=1",1242,931,true],"mh-magazine-slider":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/drealfmgrenada.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/131356185_832069707582911_5831691780190067044_n.jpg?resize=1030%2C438&ssl=1",1030,438,true],"mh-magazine-content":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/drealfmgrenada.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/131356185_832069707582911_5831691780190067044_n.jpg?resize=678%2C381&ssl=1",678,381,true],"mh-magazine-large":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/drealfmgrenada.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/131356185_832069707582911_5831691780190067044_n.jpg?resize=678%2C509&ssl=1",678,509,true],"mh-magazine-medium":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/drealfmgrenada.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/131356185_832069707582911_5831691780190067044_n.jpg?resize=326%2C245&ssl=1",326,245,true],"mh-magazine-small":["https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/drealfmgrenada.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/12\/131356185_832069707582911_5831691780190067044_n.jpg?resize=80%2C60&ssl=1",80,60,true]},"rttpg_author":{"display_name":"adminrfm","author_link":"https:\/\/drealfmgrenada.com\/index.php\/author\/adminrfm\/"},"rttpg_comment":0,"rttpg_category":"Government News<\/a> Local News<\/a>","rttpg_excerpt":"In a ceremony at the Ministry of Works\u2019 conference room on Friday, the United States and\u00a0 Grenada signed an agreement to consolidate and reschedule certain debts owed to the\u00a0 United States to support the Government [...]","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/drealfmgrenada.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7744","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/drealfmgrenada.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/drealfmgrenada.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drealfmgrenada.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drealfmgrenada.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7744"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/drealfmgrenada.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7744\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7746,"href":"https:\/\/drealfmgrenada.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7744\/revisions\/7746"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drealfmgrenada.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/7745"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/drealfmgrenada.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7744"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drealfmgrenada.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7744"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/drealfmgrenada.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7744"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}