Raphael John-Lall

As the Unit­ed Na­tion­al Con­gress (UNC) Gov­ern­ment cel­e­brat­ed its one-year an­niver­sary on Tues­day, busi­ness lead­ers in south Trinidad re­main op­ti­mistic about the per­for­mance of the Gov­ern­ment.

Some of the is­sues that south­ern Trinidad faces in­clude un­em­ploy­ment, the clo­sure of state-owned Petrotrin and the pos­si­bil­i­ty of it re­open­ing, the open­ing of the Uni­ver­si­ty of the West In­dies (UWI) South Cam­pus and the ease of do­ing busi­ness and crime among oth­er is­sues.

Pres­i­dent of the Greater San Fer­nan­do Area Cham­ber of Com­merce Ki­ran Singh told the Busi­ness Guardian that he ac­knowl­edges that it has on­ly been one year since the UNC ad­min­is­tra­tion as­sumed of­fice, and with­in this rel­a­tive­ly short pe­ri­od, there have been “en­cour­ag­ing signs” of re­newed fo­cus, en­gage­ment and di­rec­tion for the na­tion­al econ­o­my.

He said the or­gan­i­sa­tion recog­nis­es that mean­ing­ful struc­tur­al change takes time, and as such, this first year must be viewed as a foun­da­tion-set­ting phase.

“From the per­spec­tive of the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty, there has been a no­tice­able im­prove­ment in the Gov­ern­ment’s will­ing­ness to en­gage stake­hold­ers and ad­dress long-stand­ing con­cerns. The tone of con­sul­ta­tion and open­ness has been wel­comed, par­tic­u­lar­ly as it re­lates to eco­nom­ic re­cov­ery, di­ver­si­fi­ca­tion and sup­port for small and medi­um-sized en­ter­pris­es.”

He point­ed out that the launch of a Na­tion­al Re­vi­tal­i­sa­tion plan by Prime Min­is­ter Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar late last year is a pos­i­tive move for eco­nom­ic growth. South Trinidad has been giv­en sig­nif­i­cant at­ten­tion:

* The Wa­ter­front de­vel­op­ment;

* Re­open­ing of the re­fin­ery;

* Trans­port hub;

* Open­ing of the Cou­va Hos­pi­tal and

* Open­ing of the UWI Debe Cam­pus.

In ad­di­tion, he said sev­er­al key ini­tia­tives and dis­cus­sions have gen­er­at­ed “op­ti­mism” es­pe­cial­ly for South Trinidad.

“Talks sur­round­ing the re­open­ing of the re­fin­ery have sig­nalled a se­ri­ous in­tent to re­vi­talise the en­er­gy sec­tor and stim­u­late down­stream eco­nom­ic ac­tiv­i­ty. Diplo­mat­ic talks with Venezuela, the mon­eti­sa­tion of the Man­a­tee and Drag­on nat­ur­al gas fields are ea­ger­ly an­tic­i­pat­ed in the next fis­cal year. Sim­i­lar­ly, progress and re­newed at­ten­tion to­ward de­vel­op­ment projects such as the UWI South Cam­pus and oth­er in­fra­struc­ture ini­tia­tives point to a more bal­anced ap­proach to na­tion­al de­vel­op­ment, with the south po­si­tioned as a crit­i­cal growth pole.”

He not­ed that the Cham­ber al­so wel­comes dis­cus­sions re­gard­ing the re­open­ing of an im­mi­gra­tion of­fice and ex­pand­ing the Cus­toms Di­vi­sion in San Fer­nan­do.

“These are prac­ti­cal and im­pact­ful mea­sures that would sig­nif­i­cant­ly im­prove the ease of do­ing busi­ness, re­duce ad­min­is­tra­tive bur­dens, and bet­ter serve both the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty and the wider pub­lic in the south­ern re­gion. De­cen­tral­is­ing key gov­ern­ment ser­vices is an im­por­tant step to­ward ef­fi­cien­cy and ac­ces­si­bil­i­ty, and we strong­ly sup­port this di­rec­tion,” Singh said.

At the same time, he said the group recog­nis­es that while the pol­i­cy di­rec­tion is en­cour­ag­ing, many busi­ness­es are still nav­i­gat­ing per­sis­tent chal­lenges.

“Is­sues such as for­eign ex­change ac­cess, crime, and op­er­a­tional costs con­tin­ue to im­pact day-to-day busi­ness ac­tiv­i­ty. How­ev­er, there is a grow­ing sense that these is­sues are be­ing ac­knowl­edged at the pol­i­cy lev­el, and that steps are be­ing con­sid­ered to ad­dress them in a more struc­tured way.”

He added that the past year has al­so high­light­ed the re­al­i­ties of op­er­at­ing with­in a con­strained fis­cal and glob­al en­vi­ron­ment, and he com­mends the Gov­ern­ment for main­tain­ing fo­cus on sta­bil­i­ty while lay­ing the ground­work for fu­ture growth.

“Busi­ness­es re­main cau­tious­ly op­ti­mistic that on­go­ing ini­tia­tives—par­tic­u­lar­ly in en­er­gy, in­fra­struc­ture, and pub­lic ser­vice de­liv­ery will trans­late in­to tan­gi­ble out­comes in the short to medi­um term.”

He em­pha­sised that the progress made thus far is a pos­i­tive start.

“The pri­or­i­ty go­ing for­ward must be on ex­e­cu­tion, de­liv­ery and mea­sur­able im­pact. The busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty stands ready to work along­side the Gov­ern­ment to en­sure that these ini­tia­tives on en­er­gy, re­gion­al de­vel­op­ment and pub­lic ser­vice ac­cess re­sult in re­al op­por­tu­ni­ties, im­proved ef­fi­cien­cies and sus­tained eco­nom­ic growth for Trinidad and To­ba­go.”

Pres­i­dent of the San Fer­nan­do Busi­ness As­so­ci­a­tion, Daphne Bartlett told the Busi­ness Guardian that the T&T’s econ­o­my de­pends on get­ting gas from the cross and near bor­der fields with Venezuela and over the past year, the Gov­ern­ment has made strides in its at­tempt to res­ur­rect the en­er­gy in­dus­try.

“Nine­ty per cent of the econ­o­mists said the re­fin­ery would not be re­opened. They al­so thought that a mir­a­cle would have to oc­cur to get the Of­fice of For­eign As­sets Con­trol (OFAC) li­cences for the Drag­on. Now we have the Pres­i­dent of Guyana and oth­er in­ter­ests want­i­ng to in­vest in our en­er­gy sec­tor.”

She al­so said that there were “pos­i­tive changes” in na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty that led to a de­crease in vi­o­lent crime such as the in­tro­duc­tion of the Home In­va­sion Bill.

She added that di­ver­si­fi­ca­tion is im­por­tant and tourism must be de­vel­oped.

“The re­cent vis­it to our coun­try by glob­al in­flu­encer IShowSpeed cer­tain­ly gave tourism a big glob­al plug.”

En­cour­ag­ing signs

For­mer pres­i­dent of the Pe­nal/Debe Busi­ness Cham­ber Moti­lal Ram­s­ingh told the Busi­ness Guardian one year in, the Gov­ern­ment can rea­son­ably point to some en­cour­ag­ing signs such as a re­port­ed re­duc­tion in mur­ders, and a more ac­tive pos­ture on the en­er­gy front, in­clud­ing the ap­point­ment of a com­mit­tee to ex­am­ine the fea­si­bil­i­ty of restart­ing re­fin­ery op­er­a­tions and ad­vanc­ing its rec­om­men­da­tions.

How­ev­er, he said that the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty’s as­sess­ment is like­ly to be one of “cau­tious op­ti­mism” not full con­fi­dence.

“T&T is op­er­at­ing in a far more dif­fi­cult glob­al en­vi­ron­ment, with weak­er trade and in­vest­ment con­di­tions, se­cu­ri­ty pres­sures for­eign ex­change con­straints, weak en­er­gy pro­duc­tion, fis­cal deficits, ris­ing pub­lic debt, and frag­ile pub­lic trust and in­creased so­cial pres­sures. This is the re­al­i­ty.”

He said the re­al test in year two will not be an­nounce­ments, com­mit­tees, or cu­rat­ed so­cial me­dia po­lit­i­cal mes­sag­ing, but ex­e­cu­tion as in­vestors and busi­ness­es will be look­ing for clear pol­i­cy, ev­i­dence-based de­ci­sions, com­mer­cial­ly sound projects, im­proved for­eign ex­change avail­abil­i­ty, stronger en­er­gy out­put and mea­sur­able eco­nom­ic re­sults.”

“Mov­ing from sta­bil­i­sa­tion to trans­for­ma­tion will re­quire ca­pa­ble peo­ple in the right po­si­tions, prop­er fund­ing tied to na­tion­al pri­or­i­ties, hon­est com­mu­ni­ca­tion with cit­i­zens, and much stronger ac­count­abil­i­ty for im­ple­men­ta­tion.”

He al­so said with lo­cal gov­ern­ment elec­tions due next year, there will no doubt be pres­sure to ac­cel­er­ate de­liv­ery.

“But that al­so brings eco­nom­ic and po­lit­i­cal risk. The chal­lenge is to en­sure that de­liv­ery is not dri­ven by elec­tion time­lines, but by sound plan­ning, na­tion­al pri­or­i­ties, and sus­tain­able eco­nom­ic ben­e­fit. Hope­ful­ly the Gov­ern­ment will stay the course?”

Gains made

Pres­i­dent of the Siparia Cham­ber of Com­merce, Emer­son Ched­die, told the Busi­ness Guardian he be­lieves the Gov­ern­ment has ad­vanced a strong and for­ward-look­ing eco­nom­ic agen­da, de­liv­er­ing tan­gi­ble progress in en­er­gy, in­vest­ment, em­ploy­ment and na­tion­al de­vel­op­ment in its first year in of­fice.

“Since as­sum­ing of­fice, the ad­min­is­tra­tion has tak­en de­ci­sive steps to sta­bilise and grow the econ­o­my, with a clear fo­cus on di­ver­si­fi­ca­tion while strength­en­ing the coun­try’s core en­er­gy sec­tor. No­tably, there has been re­newed mo­men­tum in oil and gas pro­duc­tion, help­ing to re­in­force Trinidad and To­ba­go’s po­si­tion as a lead­ing en­er­gy pro­duc­er in the re­gion and pro­vid­ing crit­i­cal rev­enue to sup­port na­tion­al de­vel­op­ment.”

He said as far as he has seen, the Gov­ern­ment has ac­tive­ly sup­port­ed strate­gic en­er­gy ini­tia­tives with sig­nif­i­cant long-term po­ten­tial.

“Among these is the Drag­on gas project, which rep­re­sents a ma­jor op­por­tu­ni­ty to un­lock new nat­ur­al gas sup­plies and boost down­stream in­dus­tries. In par­al­lel, in­creased in­ter­est and prospec­tive drilling ac­tiv­i­ty by Exxon­Mo­bil sig­nal grow­ing in­ter­na­tion­al con­fi­dence in Trinidad and To­ba­go’s en­er­gy sec­tor and its in­vest­ment cli­mate.”

He said one year in a five-year term is on­ly the start but he is op­ti­mistic that the Gov­ern­ment will con­tin­ue to part­ner with the busi­ness sec­tor to find so­lu­tions.

“While many of these ini­tia­tives are still in their ear­ly stages, the progress to date un­der­scores a clear and pos­i­tive tra­jec­to­ry—one that pri­ori­tis­es eco­nom­ic ex­pan­sion, in­creased in­vest­ment, and a more pros­per­ous fu­ture for all cit­i­zens.”