Even as Jamaica prepares for its June 2015 6th Biennial Jamaica Diaspora Conference under the theme ‘Jamaica and the Diaspora: Linking for Growth and Prosperity,’ one of Guyana’s prominent hoteliers and businessmen believes that more closely embracing Guyanese in the diaspora as investors in the country’s economy is a direction which the new Granger administration is likely to take.
Chief Executive Officer of the Pegasus Hotel Robert Badal told Stabroek Business in an extended interview earlier this week that serious engagements between Guyanese in the diaspora and the new administration would be a logical corollary to the interface that ensued between the APNU-AFC coalition and overseas-based Guyanese during the elections campaign. “It is a direction in which I would expect the government to go in order to attract investment and other forms of support for Guyana from the diaspora,” Badal said.
Convened by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, the Jamaica Diaspora Conference is the global forum that connects Jamaicans from all over the world with Jamaicans in the home country every two years.
The event seeks to strengthen existing linkages and networks, and to build alliances for Jamaica’s development and standing in the world.
Two years ago more than 1,500 persons attended the Conference which featured a Marketplace Expo, fast tracked government services, targeted discussions and hospitality events.
While government-driven initiatives have, in the past, succeeded in attracting some measure of modest investment here by Guyanese in the diaspora those efforts have fallen well short of what is widely believed to be the potential that exists for diaspora contribution to the growth of the Guyanese economy. Badal is one of a number of businessmen who have, over time, advocated the removal of ‘red tape’ and what are considered to be other blockages to encouraging a more aggressive flow of diaspora investment in the country’s economy.
One of the innovations of the Jamaica Diaspora Conference has been the creation of an Implementation Council which works in collaboration with state agencies individuals and interest groups in the Diaspora to take action on the major recommendations from the diaspora conference.
This year’s Jamaica Diaspora Conference will continue to place special focus on Trade and Investment and Badal said he believed it was not by accident that the new administration created a specific portfolio for ‘Business’ which was intended to directly address issues pertaining to business investment in the country.
Part of the concern with the trade and investment focus of the Jamaica Diaspora Conference is with exploring specific opportunities for the diaspora to expand their business interest in Jamaica through increased trade and investment.
Stabroek Business has sought an interview with the local Private Sector Commission (PSC) to discuss its plans for engaging the new political administration but has as yet been unable to secure such a meeting.
In his assessment of the regime of public/private sector relations under the previous political administration Badal was scathing in his criticism of what he described as “timid private sector bodies that choose to play along with government and to play the role of a boys’ club that is only concerned with looking after its own interests.”
Asserting that the past ten years, particularly, had witnessed a culture of “unfair advantage being given to people favoured by the administration and a deliberate policy of marginalizing others” Badal said this had an adverse effect on investments in the country’s economy. He said that in his own instance the climate created by discriminatory official policy had him placing on hold two major investments; the first, a US$5-10 million value-added facility in the rice sector and the second a US$20-30 million investment in solar energy.
Badal said he expected that the new administration’s focus on entrepreneurship would give greater attention to the growth of the small business sector. He said that in response to what is sometimes felt to be the reluctance of local commercial banks to finance small business ventures, there was perhaps room for government to step in with financial incentives including possible tax exemptions from interest earned on loan repayments particularly for the financing of sectors that possess serious export potential.
