05 Feb 2024

Government intends to improve access to healthcare services through various projects and programmes, Minister of Finance, Ms Peggy Serame has said.

Delivering the 2023/24 budget proposal yesterday, she said the construction, upgrading and maintenance of health facilities as well as improving the rollout and uptake of healthcare programmes would be undertaken as a matter of priority.
Furthermore, she said Batswana would have improved access to education, economic empowerment programmes and job opportunities across different sectors of the economy to improve and sustain their livelihoods.

In that regard, she said a budgetary provision of P6.09 billion was proposed compared to P5.35 billion of the current year’s budget, which represents an increase of 13.8 per cent.

Minister Serame also said the 2019 informal sector strategy would be reviewed during the 2024/2025 financial year with implementation expected the same year.

The strategy, she said, would consider how government could facilitate the provision of decent places of operation for informal businesses, and to provide capacity-building that was essential for skills enhancement, improved market access and to incorporate the sector into the mainstream economy.

Ms Serame said the review would also include recommendations from the informal and formal, small, medium and micro enterprises profiling study that was conducted in 2021. Ends