Recently elected Chairman of the Essequibo Chamber of Commerce Aadil Baksh has told the Stabroek Business that numbered among his priorities as head of the Business Support Organization (BSO), is to create an environment in which key state institutions tasked with providing services that have to do with the well-being of the country’s business community are suitably responsive to the needs of the Essequibo business community.
Towards the end of last year, and having collaborated with colleagues in the authorship of a report on agri-food systems in Latin America and the Caribbean, Michael Morris, an expert on agriculture at the World Bank, gave an incisive interview on agricultural systems in the region, examining their strengths and weaknesses and providing a perspective on how those systems can be refined and improved to take account of better fulfilling its obligation to realising food security in the region and secondly, adopting systems that seek to mitigate the effects of climate change.
If Latin America and the Caribbean may not be ideally positioned to follow developed countries seeking to ensure that their higher education systems return to normalcy at the earliest possible time, some institutions in the region would appear to be moving to ensure that they are not left too far behind.
In what will be seen as a break from customary state practice, recently installed Cuban President Miguel Diaz-Canel on Wednesday, July 14, used a public speech intended as an official pronouncement on the recent street protests in Havana to look inward at what he said were his government’s shortcomings in handling what, reportedly, are mostly public concerns over food shortages that triggered the demonstrations.
Few if any issues symbolise the failure of the integrationist intent of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) than its failure, over more than three decades, to realise the implementation of its hoped-for Single Market and Economy (CSME), and at the end of yet another meeting of CARICOM Heads… a virtual one, this time around, in the light of the still rampaging coronavirus, the regional movement’s new Chairman, Antigua’s Prime Minister Gaston Browne said that regional Heads have agreed to have yet another tilt at the elusive goal.
A study released by the International Tropical Timber Organization (ITTO) earlier this month points to what it says is “an opportunity for tropical timber producers” arising out the likely doubling of global resource use by 2050.
Just days after Caribbean Development Bank (CDB) president, Hyginus ‘Gene’ Leon, had expressed skepticism regarding the likelihood of Caribbean countries realising the 2030 time frame for the achievement of the United Nations-designated Social Development Goals (SDG), the government of Trinidad and Tobago has publicly stated its commitment to attaining those goals, the hurdles placed in its way by the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic notwithstanding.
It is not the Stabroek Business’ impression that the recent engagement between President Irfaan Ali and representatives of the private sector would have taken full account of the particular concerns of micro and small businesses even though this does not necessarily suggest that there is not, somewhere in the pipeline, some plan that will unfold, sooner rather than later, for the President to engage, eyeball to eyeball (figuratively speaking, of course) with some representative group from the thousands of small businesses across the country, many if not most of which share common problems that require common solutions.
The gains from what is expected to be a measure of economic growth for Latin America and the Caribbean this year will not be sufficient to compensate for the crippling effects of the economic crisis inflicted on countries of the region by the COVID-19 pandemic, a new report from the Economic Commission for Latin America & the Caribbean (ECLAC) is warning.
With the challenges associated with direct marketing these days extending beyond operating costs (which include staff and premises and the high cost of marketing utilising conventional marketing methods) increasing numbers of small, emerging businesses are seeking to find ways of reducing the costs of product promotion and by extension, broadening their market base.
The chances that the world will succeed in realising its commitment to end global hunger by 2030 have been reduced dramatically by the objective realities that it faces less than nine years before it has to face its target date.
In our Friday June 25th issue the Stabroek Business published a story (“Mahaica River cattle farmer flirting with local Paneer market” in which we related the story of Flora Gardens, Mahaica River cattle farmer Mohan Singh, who, from all appearances, has made a pleasing entry into the local Paneer Cheese market.
The Florida-based Royal Caribbean and Carnival Cruise Lines is joining forces with The Bahamas to undertake a whopping US$350 million investment in the upgrading of the Grand Bahama Shipyard, an unmistakable indication that one of the region’s best-known tourist havens will continue to bank on the sector to drive its economy in the period ahead.
Offshore drilling in Guyana, mainly by ExxonMobil, has in the past years unearthed more than 9 billion barrels of oil equivalent, making Guyana a place to be when it comes to deepwater exploration, and as of December 2019, production, with multiple FPSOs planned for deployment in the coming years.
Even as the regional discourse over what is widely seen as the lack of action by Caribbean Community (CARICOM) governments in response to charges that their fragile economies are inadequate to support the extent of the region’s food import bill, a former Barbadian senator and still active politician is challenging the administration of Prime Minister Mia Mottley to “place agriculture on the “front burner” of government policy.
By Tsvetana Paraskova for Oilprice.com
Cuba has seen in recent days, the biggest protests in decades as thousands of people took to the streets in the Communist-run country to demand freedom.
