President of Haiti Michel Martelly, President of Guatemala Otto Perez Molina, US Deputy Secretary of Commerce Bruce Andrews and OAS Secretary General Jose Miguel Insulza are among the dignitaries in T&T for the VIII Americas Competitiveness Forum (ACF) which begins today at the Hyatt Regency in Port-of-Spain. The theme is The Human Imagination at Work: Driving Competitiveness, Powering Innovation.
Some 800 people, including 290 delegates from 46 countries, are expected to attend the three-day event which is being hosted by the Ministry of Planning and Sustainable Development. According to information from the ACF Secretariat, the largest country delegation is the United States, the largest Caribbean delegation is Barbados, the largest from Central American is Panama and the largest South American delegation is Colombia.
Today, 300 private sector representatives will take part in the ACF's main business session, the Forum for Partnership in the Americas, which is being co-ordinated by the Council for Competitiveness and Innovation and the Association of American Chambers of Commerce in Latin America (AACCLA) for the Ministry of Planning.Aimed at senior executives and leading entrepreneurs from throughout the region, the theme for the all-day session is Tapping Imagination for Sustainable Business Innovation.
The introductory session will be chaired by Gabor George Burt a global authority on re-imagining boundaries. A mastermind of innovation, creativity and strategy development, Burt is highly successful in enabling organisations to overstep perceived limitations and to carve out successful growth strategies. His book Slingshot is the source and step-by-step framework for re-imagining self-imposed, mental limits.
Burt was named on a recent list of Top Visionaries, gave the opening presentation at the World Marketing Forum in 2013 and is both a speaker and event facilitator for the Forum for Partnership in the Americas. He writes articles for leading business publications, and is interviewed on major television, radio and newspaper networks. He holds a BA in psychology and economics from Amherst College as well as an MBA from INSEAD, France.
Other featured presenters throughout the day include Daniel Levine, one of the world's best-known trends experts, director of The Avant-Guide Institute and the global editor of the popular social trends Web site WikiTrend.org and Peter Sage, an extreme entrepreneur with more than 20 years of experience growing fast-paced enterprises, as well as author of 5 Keys To Master Your Life, a top selling business book.
Norman Sabga, group chairman and chief executive, Ansa McAL Group of Companies, will speak on How the ANSA Group of Companies is Tapping Imagination for Sustainable Business Innovation and Haitian President Michel Martelly's address will be on Haiti as the New Frontier in the Hemisphere–Underdevelopment as Development Opportunity.
This evening Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar will be the feature speaker at the official opening ceremony of the ACF starting at 7.30 pm at the Southern Academy of the Performing Arts in San Fernando.