<B>By Pauline Etienne</B>

The idea of making Mauritius a duty-free paradise is not such a bad idea after all? Mauritius has had tough times recently with its textiles and sugar; and yet, taking such a quick decision can seem like a doubtful measure to most rational people.

However, an increase in purchasing power is not bad news as long as it doesn?t undermine the rest of the economy. If such an initiative could bring future economic recovery, the risks may well be worth it!

Such a popular budget was expected as it the last one of the present government. Whether it is to compensate for the difficulties people have faced during the past five years or for purely political reasons is not the point. However, a budget cannot be based just on one single initiative.

Many may have the same impression as I have. Some sectors have been heavily neglected for the benefit of the duty-free paradise. Without even taking into account that the duty-free paradise may not prove profitable to the economy, the fact remains that some areas, which we thought it would have been in the public interest to develop, have been put aside, it seems.

Let?s take women for instance. Although I must admit I am not a hard-core feminist, I still wonder why the minister of Finance has said only a few words about their condition while one of the government?s hobby-horses is indeed the under-representation of women in society, be it at the political level or elsewhere.

Although the budget was not expected to bring a solution to this problem, a larger place granted to women would have shown the government really cares about their lot. In the event the subject was passed over very rapidly. It seems the government has not found it useful to dwell on that matter. This might be a political miscalculation and not the only one!

The government is boasting about making Mauritius a cyber island. Fine. We could become one. But what signals is the minister of Finance sending to this sector when he hardly mentioned information and communication technologies in his three-hour budget speech. Not a single word about training Mauritians for a career in this field nor about investment facilities in this sector.

Likewise, with the sugar and textile sectors declining and expected to decline even more in the coming months, tourism may be the sector we will have to rely on. In this context too, the Finance minister could have done much better.

The government intends to allocate millions to special marketing plans that the minister of Tourism will set up in Europe and other foreign countries. But the form of his presentation was quite inadequate, I think. I know there?s a lot to say in a budget speech but tourism is a sector that deserved more than just a few minutes.

It should be clear that I am not against the measures taken in the budget. I even believe that the minister of Finance has succeeded in this last budget presentation before the next general elections. I am in favour of innovative measures such as the ones concerning the duty-free paradise.

But this is not reason enough for neglecting other sectors. Some definitely deserved more consideration than they had in this budget.