PE­TER CHRISTO­PHER

Se­nior Mul­ti­me­dia Re­porter

pe­ter.christo­pher@guardian.co.tt

De­spite the in­tro­duc­tion of a visa re­quire­ment for T&T na­tion­als to trav­el to the Unit­ed King­dom, trade be­tween the coun­tries is still strong, with trade cross­ing £1 bil­lion be­tween the coun­tries from Ju­ly 2024 and June 2025.

This was re­port­ed by British High Com­mis­sion­er in T&T, Jon Dean, at the King’s Birth­day Par­ty Re­cep­tion at the High Com­mis­sion­er’s res­i­dence in Mar­aval on Wednes­day.

“Be­tween Ju­ly 2024 and June 2025, to­tal trade in goods and ser­vices be­tween our two na­tions reached an im­pres­sive £1.3 bil­lion. This is a re­mark­able in­crease of over 105 per cent, or £684 mil­lion, com­pared to the pre­vi­ous year,” he said. “This in­crease un­der­lines the grow­ing busi­ness be­tween our coun­tries with brands like JCB, GSK; As­traZeneca; Di­a­geo, Twin­nings, Wait­rose, Mi­ni Coop­er, Land Rover and many, many more hav­ing be­come house­hold names in Trinidad and To­ba­go.”

The High Com­mis­sion­er said he hoped to see trade con­tin­ue to flour­ish be­tween the coun­tries, adding that UK firms’ sup­port ma­jor in­fra­struc­ture projects across the pri­vate and pub­lic sec­tor re­mained a key pri­or­i­ty.

Dean, how­ev­er, did speak of the de­ci­sion made in March to im­pose a UK visa re­quire­ment for T&T cit­i­zens, which he re­ferred to as the ele­phant in the gar­den.

“I have spo­ken about the con­nec­tions that bind us, but I must al­so speak about the bar­ri­ers be­tween us. In March, the UK in­tro­duced a vis­i­tor visa re­quire­ment for Trinidad and To­ba­go na­tion­als for the first time. This was not an easy de­ci­sion for my min­is­ters. It fol­lowed a sus­tained rise in asy­lum claims from Trinidad and To­ba­go na­tion­als at the UK bor­der. While most trav­ellers com­ply with the rules, we need­ed to pro­tect the in­tegri­ty of our im­mi­gra­tion sys­tem and ad­dress in­stances where it is mis­used. The UK’s first du­ty is to safe­guard its bor­ders and main­tain a fair sys­tem for all,” said the high com­mis­sion­er.

He con­tin­ued, “That de­ci­sion, while dif­fi­cult, in no way di­min­ish­es our friend­ship, nor does it re­duce the strength and depth of our bi­lat­er­al re­la­tion­ship. On the con­trary, we re­main ful­ly com­mit­ted to our part­ner­ship with Trinidad and To­ba­go and to mak­ing the process for ap­ply­ing for a visa as smooth, ef­fi­cient, and ac­ces­si­ble as pos­si­ble.”

He said the UK re­mained com­mit­ted to ex­pand­ing trade to the UK as he stat­ed, ‘The Mem­o­ran­dum of Un­der­stand­ing be­tween UK Ex­port Fi­nance and Trinidad and To­ba­go is one way we can ac­cel­er­ate trade and in­vest­ment be­tween our two coun­tries. The agree­ment makes avail­able up to £5 bil­lion in fi­nanc­ing for projects in in­fra­struc­ture, health­care and na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty, sup­port­ing your na­tion­al de­vel­op­ment ob­jec­tives.”

The event was at­tend­ed by sev­er­al mem­bers of Cab­i­net in­clud­ing For­eign Af­fairs Min­is­ter Sean Sobers who al­so shared re­marks, hail­ing the pos­i­tive re­la­tion­ship be­tween the coun­tries.