[Bolivia] ...outlines ambitious plans to fight poverty

from Reuters

The leftist government of Bolivian President Evo Morales has detailed ambitious public-private plans to ease poverty and create hundreds of thousands of jobs in South America's poorest country.

Morales was elected in December on pledges to champion the rights of the poor, indigenous majority and reject free-market economic policies that have done little to ease poverty in Bolivia.

The economic development plan aims to create 90,000 jobs per year, eliminate illiteracy, build 100,000 homes and cut extreme poverty from 35 percent to 27 percent within five years. It also aims at a sharp increase in economic growth.

"Here are the conditions ... and the transformation that we're searching for in Bolivia," Planning Minister Carlos Villegas said as he presented the plan at the presidential palace late on Friday.

The strategy envisages public and private investment of more than $12 billion by 2011, and Villegas made it clear that the government sees the plan extending into a second five-year term of the Morales administration.

Private investment will be concentrated in the key energy and mining sectors, Villegas said. Bolivia has South America's biggest reserves of natural gas after Venezuela and is also mineral-rich, with deposits of zinc, tin, silver and gold.

Villegas said small companies, farmers and artisans would be supported with low-cost loans and he emphasized the government's drive to invest in road-building and health and maintain macroeconomic stability.

Morales nationalized the country's energy industry last month and while Villegas did not detail similar plans for other sectors, he said the state would be the main actor in the development strategy.