Busi­ness­men are cau­tious­ly op­ti­mistic about the new wave of con­struc­tion and in­vest­ment be­ing promised, call­ing it vi­sion­ary but warn­ing that ex­e­cu­tion, and not talk will de­ter­mine its suc­cess.

Their com­ments came af­ter Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar last week un­veiled her “Re­vi­tal­i­sa­tion Blue­print,” an am­bi­tious plan pledg­ing 50,919 jobs and a se­ries of pub­lic-pri­vate part­ner­ship (PPP) in­fra­struc­ture projects span­ning Port-of-Spain, San Fer­nan­do, Ga­le­o­ta Point, In­vaders Bay and the na­tion’s prison sys­tem.

Per­sad-Bisses­sar said her gov­ern­ment was seek­ing ac­tive col­lab­o­ra­tion be­tween in­ter­na­tion­al or­gan­i­sa­tions, pri­vate in­vestors and state agen­cies to dri­ve eco­nom­ic trans­for­ma­tion.

De­vel­op­er and in­vestor John Aboud said the blue­print rep­re­sents the kind of long-term vi­sion the coun­try needs, but on­ly if it comes with faster ap­provals and gen­uine fa­cil­i­ta­tion for in­vestors.

“It’s very ex­cit­ing, very vi­sion­ary,” Aboud said. “We’re al­ready re­view­ing which projects fit our com­pe­tence, and we’ll in­di­cate our in­ter­est soon. But it all de­pends on ap­provals. That’s the frus­tra­tion that slows every­thing down.”

He cit­ed his own Mar­riott ho­tel de­vel­op­ment project in Rocky Point, To­ba­go, which has been stuck in the sys­tem for three years as an ex­am­ple of how bu­reau­cra­cy con­tin­ues to choke pri­vate in­vest­ment.

“The chal­lenge here is im­ple­men­ta­tion and the roll­out,” he said. “The process­es and ap­provals take a hell of a lot of time and frus­trate de­vel­op­ers. That’s my area of con­cern.”

Aboud said he wel­comed the Prime Min­is­ter’s pledge to cre­ate a “one-stop shop” for in­vest­ment, adding that if ap­provals move faster, con­struc­tion and jobs will fol­low. “We are hope­ful that by the end of the first quar­ter next year we’ll fi­nal­ly break ground in To­ba­go and start the sod­turn­ing at the San Fer­nan­do site by Jan­u­ary.”

For Pe­ter George Jr, CEO of the Trot­ters Group, the lan­guage around pub­lic-pri­vate part­ner­ships marks a ma­jor, much-need­ed shift in na­tion­al de­vel­op­ment strat­e­gy.

“It’s a good sign,” George said. “But this can’t turn in­to an­oth­er round of mas­sive, cap­i­tal-in­ten­sive gov­ern­ment projects that end up as white ele­phants like Na­tion­al Acad­e­my for the Per­form­ing Arts (NA­PA), South­ern Acad­e­my for Per­form­ing Arts (SAPA) and the gov­ern­ment cam­pus­es.” He ar­gued that in­volv­ing the pri­vate sec­tor will make projects bank­able and mon­eti­s­able, tak­ing the fi­nan­cial weight off the state.

“That’s the right mod­el. The gov­ern­ment can’t do these things alone. Cap­i­tal goes where op­por­tu­ni­ty ex­ists. If the op­por­tu­ni­ties are vi­able and prof­itable, in­vestors will come,” George said.

He warned, how­ev­er, that some pro­pos­als, like the Car­rera Is­land de­vel­op­ment, ap­pear un­re­al­is­tic.

“It’s an am­bi­tious idea, but the ac­cess and in­fra­struc­ture just aren’t there,” he said. “But over­all, this piv­ot to re­al part­ner­ships is pos­i­tive and long over­due. The proof of the pud­ding is in the eat­ing.”

Derek Chin, founder of Movi­eTowne, said the plan aligns with his long-stand­ing call for tourism-dri­ven di­ver­si­fi­ca­tion and sus­tain­able de­vel­op­ment.

“This has been on the agen­da for some time,” Chin said. “But it comes down to the right con­cept projects that can at­tract for­eign ex­change and stand on their own two feet.”

Chin said he in­tends to re­vive his “Streets of the World” project, now ex­pand­ed in­to “Pavil­ions of the Caribbean,” and pitch it again to the gov­ern­ment as a flag­ship de­vel­op­ment for In­vaders Bay.

“It’s a true di­ver­si­fi­ca­tion ini­tia­tive that would trans­form Trinidad’s tourism ap­peal and cre­ate sus­tain­able rev­enue. The coun­try lost out big time when it was shelved years ago,” Chin said.

He warned, though, that in­cen­tives and fund­ing struc­tures must be clear. “Few can de­liv­er sus­tain­able projects that earn mon­ey. Look at NA­PA, nice, but it costs tax­pay­ers and nev­er earns its keep. That’s what mat­ters now. We need projects that can pay their way,” said Chin.

He ap­plaud­ed Per­sad-Bisses­sar’s re­newed fo­cus on city re­new­al. “Our cities are run down,” he said. “It’s com­mend­able that the dis­cus­sions are back on the ta­ble. What’s been miss­ing all along is the vi­sion.”

The Prime Min­is­ter’s blue­print lays out a grand plan for jobs, con­struc­tion, re­vi­tal­i­sa­tion, and part­ner­ship, but busi­ness lead­ers are clear: de­liv­ery will de­ter­mine whether it’s a turn­ing point or just an­oth­er an­nounce­ment.

Aboud wants ap­proval to move. George wants part­ner­ships that pro­duce re­turns. Chin wants projects that gen­er­ate for­eign ex­change.

At the end of the day, the busi­ness­men agree vi­sion means noth­ing with­out ex­e­cu­tion.
Al­so speak­ing on the Gov­ern­ment’s new Re­vi­tal­i­sa­tion Blue­print last Fri­day, ANSA McAL ex­ec­u­tive chair­man A. Nor­man Sab­ga said he was “very ex­cit­ed” about the scale of the plans. “It’s huge. It’s ex­cit­ing. Where they want to take this coun­try re­quires dream­ing big,” Sab­ga said. “We need to dream big, man­age the de­tails, and move the coun­try for­ward. That’s what we are do­ing as an or­gan­i­sa­tion, plan­ning and in­vest­ing with the fu­ture in mind.”

Growth must in­clude SMEs and com­mu­ni­ties
The Greater Tu­na­puna Cham­ber of In­dus­try and Com­merce (GT­CIC) has al­so thrown its sup­port be­hind the Gov­ern­ment’s Na­tion­al Re­vi­tal­i­sa­tion Blue­print, de­scrib­ing it as a bold and much-need­ed step to­ward re­build­ing in­vestor con­fi­dence and stim­u­lat­ing broad-based eco­nom­ic growth.

GT­CIC pres­i­dent Ra­mon Gre­go­rio told the Sun­day Busi­ness Guardian the plan, span­ning more than 100 in­fra­struc­ture and ur­ban re­new­al projects, has the po­ten­tial to re­shape Trinidad and To­ba­go’s eco­nom­ic land­scape, but on­ly if im­ple­ment­ed trans­par­ent­ly and in­clu­sive­ly.

Gre­go­rio, who found­ed and op­er­ates a mar­ket re­search firm, said while the Cham­ber ap­plaud­ed the Gov­ern­ment’s com­mit­ment to job cre­ation and long-term growth, the re­al mea­sure of suc­cess will be whether the ben­e­fits reach lo­cal small and medi­um en­ter­pris­es, youth en­tre­pre­neurs, and com­mu­ni­ty con­trac­tors.

“This bil­lion-dol­lar re­vi­tal­i­sa­tion plan of­fers re­al hope for eco­nom­ic re­cov­ery and re­newed in­vestor con­fi­dence,” Gre­go­rio said. “But the suc­cess of this plan will de­pend on how ef­fec­tive­ly it in­cludes our Small and Medi­um-sized En­ter­pris­es (SMEs), youth, and lo­cal com­mu­ni­ties in the val­ue chain.

De­vel­op­ment must be par­tic­i­pa­to­ry and trans­par­ent if it is to be tru­ly sus­tain­able.”

The Cham­ber stressed that ma­jor pub­lic projects must not on­ly beau­ti­fy cities or at­tract for­eign cap­i­tal but must al­so build do­mes­tic ca­pac­i­ty and cre­ate op­por­tu­ni­ties for lo­cal sup­pli­ers and skilled labour. It urged the Gov­ern­ment to pri­ori­tise clear pro­cure­ment ac­cess for small­er firms, en­force lo­cal con­tent poli­cies, and en­sure that mon­i­tor­ing sys­tems are in place to track progress and cost ef­fi­cien­cy.

Gre­go­rio al­so em­pha­sised that re­vi­tal­i­sa­tion must go hand in hand with skills train­ing, es­pe­cial­ly for young peo­ple en­ter­ing the work­force, and called for on­go­ing com­mu­ni­ty en­gage­ment to en­sure projects align with lo­cal needs and en­vi­ron­men­tal re­al­i­ties.

The GT­CIC said it stands ready to col­lab­o­rate with na­tion­al au­thor­i­ties, pri­vate in­vestors, and civ­il so­ci­ety groups to help de­liv­er mea­sur­able and eq­ui­table re­sults. “We must en­sure that the gains from this re­vi­tal­i­sa­tion agen­da reach all cit­i­zens, not just a few,” Gre­go­rio said. “That’s how we turn vi­sion in­to re­al, sus­tain­able trans­for­ma­tion.”