The man­u­fac­ture of al­ter­na­tives to wheat flour, such as cas­sa­va, was among dis­cus­sions held with the T&T Man­u­fac­tur­ers’ As­so­ci­a­tion (TTMA) and To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly (THA).

A state­ment from the TTMA said pres­i­dent Tri­cia Coos­al re­cent­ly held dis­cus­sions with the THA’s Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine to strength­en ties be­tween the two or­gan­i­sa­tions.

Coos­al said these talks sig­nalled the TTMA’s com­mit­ment to pro­mot­ing man­u­fac­tur­ing.

“Par­tic­u­lar­ly in­ter­est­ing is, in­ter alia, the man­u­fac­tur­ing of al­ter­na­tive sources of flour such as cas­sa­va flour in To­ba­go as peo­ple seek healthy al­ter­na­tives to wheat flour,” she ex­plained.

Dis­cus­sions al­so in­clud­ed THA’s pres­ence at the Trade and In­vest­ment Con­ven­tion (TIC) 2022, ex­pect­ed to place at the Cen­tre of Ex­cel­lence, Ma­coya from Au­gust 25 to Au­gust 27.

At the con­ven­tion, the cas­sa­va flour and many oth­er prod­ucts from To­ba­go will be on dis­play, the TTMA said.

“TTMA looks for­ward to a height­ened pres­ence from To­ba­go at TIC this year and in the com­ing years as we seek to con­tin­ue to carve out a sig­nif­i­cant space for To­ba­go at fu­ture TICs. This year, To­ba­go will be tak­ing 14 booths at TIC with cul­tur­al in­ter­ludes tak­ing place at their booths. TTMA wel­comes this show­cas­ing of lo­cal tal­ent and in­ten­si­fied cul­tur­al ex­hi­bi­tion at the show,” Coos­al added.

Coos­al said the TTMA is al­so look­ing for­ward to pay a cour­tesy call on Au­gus­tine to gath­er and share in­for­ma­tion, which will pro­mote a deep­er ap­pre­ci­a­tion of the non-en­er­gy man­u­fac­tur­ing sec­tor in To­ba­go.