Trinidad to establish trading links with Central America

Trinidad and Tobago is looking to sign Partial Scope Trade Agreements with countries in Central America as it seeks to diversify its traditional export markets, particularly in CARICOM.

Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar said Tuesday that Port-of-Spain would soon be signing an agreement with Panama that would allow limited number of products and services to enter the Panamanian market.

"In this regard, I will encourage our exporters to take advantage of this opportunity," Persad-Bissessar said, while addressing this year's 'Prime Minister's Exporter of the Year Award' function.

After consulting with the key private-sector associations, "we believe Central America should be the next frontier for our exporters", the PM said.

Persad-Bissessar told the business community that her eight-month-old government believes in developing closer economic and trade ties.

"One clearly under-utilised tool in the engagement of foreign policy and trade has been the opportunities which can be grasped by leveraging the entrepreneurial skills, talents and networking prowess of our diaspora in North America and Europe," she said.

"Traditionally, we tended to view that the only benefits from the diaspora came in the form of remittances," the Prime Minister said.

"We need to target, engage and encourage more of these types of businesses, as these are not only retailers of products, but as ambassadors of Trinidad and Tobago, promoting our food, our culture, our way of life in a foreign land and, more important, earning a profit from it."

She said the government has invested billions of dollars in educating its citizens, as well as in crafting a competitive tertiary educational system.

"We believe that the educational entrepreneurs should look beyond Trinidad and Tobago. We have a vision of Trinidad and Tobago being the hub of educational services for CARICOM, as well as Africa," she said, making reference to the number of Caribbean students who are pursuing studies here.

"We now need to ensure that our educational services are internationally accredited, our programmes are relevant and quality assured to the highest international benchmarks, and begin to promote these services."

During her address, the prime minister also pushed back at commentators who say the local economy is stagnant.

"Our view is much different. We believe that the economy is poised to take off, once we grasp the opportunities at hand, once we take advantage of the new markets within our reach. We have every reason to believe that 2011 will be a year of positive economic growth," she said.

The central bank is projecting that the Trinidad economy will grow two per cent this year, led by developments in the energy sector but with the positive growth coming in the non-energy sector for the first time in three years, the PM said.

"To achieve this, though, we must all do our part; we must all take responsibility to lead this country to a path of sustained economic growth," she said.

"Our government has taken into consideration the tumultuous events of the past two years, and understands that our strategic approach to the external environment had to be revisited. Our relationships with other states and economic blocs have to be enlightened and visionary, and have to be guided by our economic survival, both in the present and for the future."

Persad-Bissessar said that as the global economy begins to recover from the financial crisis, the challenge for Trinidad and Tobago is to position itself to take full advantage of the recovery and to usher the economy back on a path of robust growth and development.

"In this regard, the government of Trinidad and Tobago is charting a unique course for development where the private sector, local and foreign companies,will be critical partners," she told the business leaders.

- CMC