Manama: Bahrain’s economic stimulus package helped secure jobs and salaries of more than 90,000 Bahrainis and supported more than 11,000 private sector employers.
This was revealed as Finance and National Economy Minister Shaikh Salman bin Khalifa Al Khalifa yesterday provided a virtual update on Bahrain’s efforts to manage the impact of the Covid-19 pandemic on the economy.
He was speaking during a high-level meeting of government ministers with MPs and Shura Council members.
The BD4.3 billion stimulus package, announced in March, provided businesses and individuals with much-needed support through paying the utility costs and exempting the municipal fees for more than 380,000 subscribed accounts.
The package is equivalent to 32.2 per cent of the country’s gross domestic product.
Over the same time period, rent on government owned industrial lands was waived for more than 730 businesses, and over 280 further businesses have been exempted from payment of tourism fees.
The Central Bank of Bahrain has taken steps to raise the lending capacity of banks and financial institutions by BD3.7bn, making available necessary additional financing which enabled repayments on existing loans to be deferred for six months.
The size of the Liquidity Support fund has been increased to BD200 million to provide additional capacity and support. To date, the fund supported more than 440 large companies as well as small and medium enterprises.
Tamkeen’s Business Continuity Support Programme has expanded its scope from initially supporting small and micro enterprises to include taxi drivers, public transport and bus drivers, driving instructors and kindergarten and nursery workers, benefiting 13,200 companies and 900 individuals to date.
“This targeted and balanced package of support across all sectors has been carefully designed to support businesses and employers in meeting the unprecedented economic challenges of Covid-19,” the minister said.
“Our twin objectives during this pandemic are to protect the health and employment of our citizens and the long-term strength of our economy.
“The government is closely monitoring traditional economic indicators as well as mining specialised datasets to build resilience in vulnerable industries. The singularity of purpose of the executive and legislative authorities continues to make our Covid-19 responses agile, swift and effective.”
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