Against the backdrop of frequent expressions of frustration by local small business owners and entrepreneurial aspirants regarding what they say is a less than welcoming posture by commercial banks towards making borrowing available for the creation of new enterprises and the consolidation of emerging and frequently struggling ones, a leading regional banking figure has told the Stabroek Business that relationships between commercial banks and their borrowers cannot be separated from the compulsory requirement of borrowers to meet the critical conditions that are vital to the protection of the interests of the banks’ depositors.
“Banks depend on paper. What are your plans? What are your financials? Banks’ decision-making is based on your ability to generate that kind of information in a concrete form. The biggest challenge we have always had with SME’s (small and medium enterprises) is that all of these ideas are in their heads but they don’t know how to put it in a format that the banks are comfortable with and can therefore use as a basis for making a comfortable decision, retired Chief Executive Officer of Republic Bank Ltd. David Dulal-Whiteway told Stabroek Business in an exclusive interview last Friday.
“That is why I ask the questions what role does education play,” said Dulal-Whiteway who on Friday delivered a paper to a Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GCCI) Business Development Forum in his current capacity as Chief Executive Officer of the Trinidad and Tobago-based Arthur Lok Jack Global School of Business.
