Moontown

Proposed regional tourism marketing fund

MONTEGO BAY, St James – Minister of Tourism, Edmund Bartlett is throwing his support behind a new regional marketing strategy to give visitors an opportunity to have “multiple experiences” in one vacation.

Bartlett was speaking yesterday at the Caricom heads of government meeting where he joined discussions about the proposed establishment of a regional tourism marketing fund.

“What we are finding is that, particularly for long hauls, airlines are quite willing to do what we call double drops and triple drops. So that you fill a plane, for example in Brussels, but you have passengers for Jamaica, for [the Dominican] Republic and say for Cuba. And that allows us to secure that flight, whilst Jamaica alone might not have been able to fill that plane and it would become quite costly and we may not have got that flight,” he said.

According to the minister such an approach would help ensure that Caribbean destinations remain profitable routes for airlines.

Questioned as to whether the strategy could work given that individual islands are competitors, he responded that each island would be able to a unique experience.

He was supported by Secretary-General of the Caribbean Tourism Organisation (CTO), Hugh Riley, who said that one of the Caribbean’s strongest qualities was its diversity.

“They (tourists) see the fact that they can have cuisine and history and art and culture and topography that is incredibly varied…So, the point is that the diversity of what we sell within the Caribbean brand is exceedingly appealing to people outside of the Caribbean, and inside of the Caribbean, by the way,” he said. (Jamaica Observer)

Prime Minister of Jamaica, Bruce Golding, and his Trinidad and Tobago (T&T) counterpart, Kamla Persad-Bissessar, are to meet tomorrow, to discuss the findings of a probe into the sale of Air Jamaica to Caribbean Airlines (CAL).

CAL took over the operations of the former lovebird in May.

Facing questions from journalists at the 31st Regular Meeting of the Conference of Heads of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) in Montego Bay, St James yesterday, Persad-Bissessar declined to comment on the findings.

She said it would be breaching protocol if she were to disclose the findings to the press, before speaking with Prime Minister Golding.

However, the T&T prime minister revealed that her government is concerned about how the deal was carried out.

The T&T prime minister also sought to assure that the Air Jamaica/CAL deal is not in trouble, stating that the decisions made tomorrow at the talks in Kingston will be beneficial to both Trinidad and Tobago and Jamaica.

Shortly after assuming office in May, the Trinidadian government set up a three-member panel to conduct a probe into the deal. (Jamaica Gleaner)

MONTEGO BAY, Jamaica, CMC - International Monetary Fund (IMF) chief, Dominique Strauss-Kahn has strongly refuted suggestions that the agency has not readily come to the rescue of Caribbean economies in the wake of the global downturn.

“When you look at the different programmes which have been put in place and the different support that we have provided to countries as a percentage of GDP (Gross Domestic Product), it’s much higher than what has been done in some other parts of the world,” Straus-Kahn said on the fringes of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) heads of government summit that ends here on Wednesday.

In an interview with the Caribbean Media Corporation (CMC), the IMF managing director said based on that method of calculation, regional countries have received more assistance per capita when compared to some larger countries on the hemisphere.

“As a percentage of GDP we helped more Jamaica or Antigua and Barbuda or other countries of the CARICOM than the big ones.

“Of course, the amounts are smaller because the countries are smaller but as a percentage of GDP, we have done more. So it’s absolutely wrong to say that we didn’t devote not only attention but the resources, not talking about technical assistance that we have provided also,” Strauss-Kahn told CMC.

The IMF chief, who described the Washington-based international lending agency as a “doctor”, has diagnosed several regional economies as being critically sick and prescribing a bitter pill to help them in their recovery.

“It’s not our fault but the country is sick and we need to try and cure it. So it is not always harmless. When you ask your doctor to come, he gives you medicine and in our case it’s mostly money. But it also tells you [that] you have to change the way how you live. If you don’t change the way you live, you can take all the medicine you want [but] you won’t heal.

“So that’s exactly what we say … we give you money to help you but at the same time we have to change the policy, the policy which put you in this situation. Of course it’s harmful, and so people don’t like us but they shouldn’t blame the doctor,” he said.

A number of CARICOM countries, including Jamaica and Antigua and Barbuda, have turned to the IMF to help prop up their economies in light of the challenges posed by the global downturn.

Strauss-Kahn said while it would be very easy for a Caribbean person to say that the conditions attached by his agency are harsh, he said the region must be willing to play by the rules.

“It is very bitter … and were I a Jamaican, I would say ‘those guys from the IMF, what are they thinking about? It’s too difficult for me.’ It’s very difficult because a mistake has been made. Also, some times not very many mistakes have been made but then the economic environment, the global crisis, and you have to face it. Life is not always easy,” he told CMC. (Jamaica Gleaner)

MONTEGO BAY, Jamaica, CMC - St. Kitts and Nevis Prime Minister Dr. Denzil Douglas on Wednesday warned Caribbean Community (CARICOM) countries that they cannot afford to abandon their Single Market and Economy (CSME), while contending that Community nationals must be free to move.

“So let us now stop, look at where we are, adjust the time lines and see if we can really achieve these goals because these goals need to be achieved if the Community is to work. We can’t abandon the Community ideals, we must have a single market and single market must have as its central operative the movement of people,” Dr. Douglas told a news conference at the annual summit of regional leaders here.

But he acknowledged that regional leaders may have been too ambitious when they agreed to have the free movement of labour across CARICOM as part of the CSME that is due to come into effect by 2015.

“We have agreed that free movement is central to the success of the single market. The fact that we have not been able to achieve free movement … we have come to the conclusion that we may have been too ambitious with regard to our time lines.

“We need therefore to stop and adjust those timelines so that we can practically achieve the single market which is critical to the success of this community we are creating,” he said, acknowledging that regional leaders would have to move “the goal post”.

The CSME allows for the free movement of goods, skills, labour and services across the region. But with respect to labour, the leaders have agreed on several categories of workers who would be allowed to move freely across the region. These include university graduates, media professionals, entertainers, sportspersons, domestic workers and health professionals.

Dr. Douglas said that the full implementation of free movement should have come into effect from this year but “we realise that is not happening”.

“We are saying that something is wrong and we have decided that we need to realistically put our heads together again, look at the reasons that are being given for not allowing people to move, a lot of them could be petty reasons, some could be serious and reasons of security as well”.

Dr. Douglas said the timelines set “were unrealistic and I think the self appraisal is important and that is what has come through from this meeting” of CARICOM leaders here.

“We have been able to frankly look at ourselves and say, there are certain areas where we have failed. Our ideals were very praise worthy, they were noble but maybe we were a little too utopian and idealistic to get it to work.”

He said that the idea should not be to “abandon proceeding towards the single economy because the single market has not been working, it has not been achieved, the idea is a single economy is critically important,” he said, noting that it is even more vitally important for the smaller states of the 15-member grouping.

“So therefore you cannot abandon it therefore let us fix that which is preventing the single market from working,” he said.

Dr. Douglas said that the current legislation in the Caribbean countries allow for the immigration officers to use their discretion in deciding whether or not to allow a person into the country.

“That is why we are saying, for example, that the Regional Security System using the model of assessment that we have established in Barbados and Trinidad and Tobago is so critical because it has been able to flag potential security breaches.

“That even strengthens our view of having a common regionally financed security system because it helps also to answer some of the questions with regards to the restrictions of movement of people freely,” he told reporters.

Dr. Douglas said that despite the situation regarding the free movement and other problems within CARICOM, he is still of the view that “the state of health of the Caribbean Community is good.

“In every institution you would have as part of its own democratic institution governance structure period of reflection, periods of criticism, periods of appraisal, reassessment and new agendas to move forward.”

He said what is critical in the summit, which ends on Wednesday, is that “we are taking those decisions by ourselves”.

The Kittitian leader said that the leaders have received a report from the Council of Ministers, the second highest decision making body within the grouping, which reviewed all CARICOM institutions.

“It is important that you do wait until you fall ill to go to the doctor, you go to the doctor to prevent yourself from getting ill and that is why you must have checkups. That is why I say the health of the Community is excellent.”

Dr. Douglas said that there is a possibility that a committee comprising foreign ministers would be appointed to re-examine the governance structure of CARICOM given the discussions held during the summit here on the matter of implementation of decisions.

“What I think is happening is an examination of the institutions, how they are functioning, the fact that we have gotten fed up, we make decisions here and the decisions are not implemented. Something has to be wrong. Let us find out what is wrong.

“The Community Council says this thing is affecting us … we need to go forward, implementation is the issue, find some way of correcting this problem,” he said, adding “they are saying the time has come for us to examine that governance structure”.

He said that the two models that had been considered by regional leaders during the meeting here were the one utilised by the sub-regional Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States and the European Union.  (Jamaica Gleaner)

Arthur Hall, Senior Staff Reporter

Guyana President Bharrat Jagdeo has given Jamaica a not-too-subtle hint that it is wasting its time whining about unfair trade practices by its Caribbean neighbours.

Instead, Jagdeo has suggested that Jamaica and other CARICOM states take their trade grouses to the regional court.

“We have recourse now to the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ),” Jagdeo told journalists yesterday during a briefing at the 31st meeting of CARICOM Heads of Government.

“We have all subscribed to the court in its original jurisdiction, which is the interpretation of the treaty, so if someone feels aggrieved and they have a strong case, they should go to the court, and if there is a court ruling the country will be forced to comply,” added Jagdeo.

The Guyana president reminded journalists that he has been vocal against protectionist barriers which have affected regional trade and accepted that some Caribbean producers might benefiting from cheaper inputs or greater subsidies.

“It is very difficult to prove those sorts of things because you are dealing with the rules of origin, and sometimes you don’t get all the information,” said Jagdeo, referring to the CCJ’s ruling against Guyana in its dispute with Trinidad Cement Limited.

Jamaica’s Industry Minister Karl Samuda was the first to complain publicly when he charged that Trinidad was using food-safety barriers to block the exportation of Jamaican patties to the twin-island republic. That row was eventually settled through negotiation, but not before some sabre-rattling by Samuda.

Agriculture Minister Dr Christopher Tufton last week charged that Jamaican primary producers were being short-changed within CARICOM as a result of a subsidised agro-processing sector in Trinidad and Tobago. (Jamaica Gleaner)

arthur.hall@gleanerjm.com

People’s National Movement Senator Dr Lester Henry claimed yesterday that the People’s Partnership campaign promise of a $20 minimum wage did not square with the objective of creating additional employment.

Henry, who was a member of the Minimum Wages Board, said most employers paid above the minimum wage in an attempt to attract better quality workers.

“So if you promise a minimum, you are sending a signal to the market that people would have to pay $23 to $25 a hour,” he said. “You should be careful… about the impact on the level of employment if you carry out such a policy,” he urged.

He was responding to the contribution from Planning, Economic and Social Restructuring and Gender Affair Minister Mary King in the Senate yesterday.

Henry said while he had no problem with the numbers King provided, he had an issue with the interpretation of the economic data provided by her.

Henry also said he was puzzled by the motivation behind the State of the Economy motion because all of the economic data provided was in the public domain and was readily available from the Central Bank or Central Statistical Office. Henry called on the Government to give credit where it was due.

One achievement of the PNM was its ability to bring the country to unprecedented low levels of unemployment in the last six to eight years, hitherto thought unthinkable, he said.

“This (high unemployment) was the perennial and intractable problem that many economies faced, including in the oil boom,” he said. “It was through dynamic and innovative policies that we were able to bring down unemployment.”

He added that “this was something that we should all be proud of as Trinbagonians”.

“In spite of the global recession, we have been able to keep unemployment losses at a relative minimum,” he said.

He said compared with countries of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, this country had done well in terms of unemployment. —Ria Taitt(Trinidad Express)

By Curtis Rampersad Business Editor

CLICO, the country’s largest insurance company, now needs more money to repay thousands of policyholders, consultants have recommended in a report delivered to Cabinet by Finance Minister Winston Dookeran.

Even with a massive cash injection, which would follow the approximately $5 billion already raised to rescue CLICO last year, the struggling company that was once the jewel in the CL Financial crown, would only be able to repay policyholders the principal amounts they put into CLICO investment products, the report said.

Dookeran prepared the report and presented the findings by consultants who were contracted by the Central Bank to Cabinet last month.

He read excerpts of the report dated June 11 to reporters at a post-Cabinet press briefing last month.

The document was titled “Report on the Nation’s Business—the state of our finances and initiatives for future action”.

It states that CLICO policyholders can get only principal and no interest on their investments over a five-year period, “provided there is a further injection of capital”.

At a post-Cabinet briefing last month, Dookeran announced former Citi banker Steve Bideshi, former finance minister Wendell Mottley and accounting expert Colin Soo Ping Chow as the team that would provide recommendations on CLICO and its parent CL Financial.

Their report, which listed a number of recommendations to restructure CLICO and CL Financial, and help both companies repay millions in debt, was submitted to Dookeran recently.

But even before this, a group of consultants, cited in the Dookeran report, said CL Financial may be “technically bankrupt” on a group consolidated basis.

But when CLICO and now defunct investment house CLICO Investment Bank are stripped from the consolidation, the remaining assets of CL Financial, such as spirits producers Angostura and Lascelles de Mercado “exhibit economic viability and appear attractive to global companies”, the Dookeran report said.

Sources have said that CL Financial debt burden is currently in the area of $15 billion and that CLICO incurred losses in 2008 of about $6 billion.

Dookeran’s report listed several challenges for CLICO and CL Financial, including ensuring that strategic assets at the companies had the right management and financial plant to repay bank debt, that non-core assets were quickly disposed and that CL Financial repay CLICO its outstanding inter-group debt which would assist CLICO in its own operations.

Sources close to the Bideshi team said their submission to Dookeran last month included a menu of options for the repayment of CLICO’s traditional and non-traditional insurance liability products.

It detailed a financial reorganisation of CL Financial, as mandated by Government, to ensure bank and inter-party debts were repaid.

Sources said the Bideshi team’s plan reflected CLICO and CL Financial’s debt and made several recommendations, including selling off some valuable but non-core assets.

It also delivered a timetable on how long the restructuring would take and how Government would be able to collect on its loans to CL Financial last year.

CL Financial controlled $100 billion in assets spread across more than 70 companies in 34 countries.

But it was saddled with rising debt and outstanding repayments in January 2009 after investors and creditors demanded hundreds of millions of dollars back from CLICO and CIB.

The government has not yet said how it will act on the recommendation of the Bideshi report.

In the meantime, some policyholders have received repayments on their CLICO investments while hundreds more still have not been repaid. (Trinidad Express)

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THERE WILL BE a two-hour interdenominational prayer service on Sunday for ailing Prime Minister David Thompson.
Several church leaders will pray at the Nazarene Church in Collymore Rock for Thompson, Barbados’ sixth Prime Minister, who has taken a two-month leave of office due to medical concerns that could lead to major surgery.
Coordinator of the service, Senator Reverend Dr David Durant, told the DAILY NATION that all parliamentarians had been invited to the event that starts at 6 p.m.
“Thompson is an oustanding citizen and the leader of the nation. This country needs to rally around him at this critical juncture,” Durant said.
He added that he was pleased with the response from denominational and independent church leaders.
Church leaders include bishops Wesley Dear of New Life Teaching Centre, Marlon Husbands of Sanctuary Empowerment Centre, Othneil Forde of the Pentecostal Assemblies of the West Indies, and Martin Brewster of the New Testament Church.
Reverend Dr Lucille Baird of Mount Zion Mission and Apostle Stephen Holford of New Dimension Ministries are also involved in the prayer session which is likely to be broadcast live.
“It is time for the nation to unite and heal in the present situation that confronts us. I am hoping Mr Thompson makes a speedy recovery.
“We know that God is able to do the impossible. As the nation unites in prayer, we know that God will intervene and show forth his divine mercy and grace,” Durant said. (MK) (Nation News)

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Acting Prime Minister Freundel Stuart at the 31st CARICOM Heads Of Government Conference in Jamaica.(Picture compliments Jamaica Gleaner)

Acting Prime Minister Freundel Stuart on Monday joined his regional counterparts in Jamaica for a full day of closed-door talks with United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon, OAS Secretary General Jose Miguel Insulza and IMF managing director Dominique Strauss-Kahn.
The plenary session between the CARICOM leaders and the heads of the three important international institutions is believed to be the first such summit in the region.
Stuart is attending his first CARICOM Heads Of Government Conference in the capacity of Prime Minister.
The 31st Meeting of Heads Of Government Of The Caribbean Community, which began in earnest last Sunday in Montego Bay, winds up tomorrow. CARICOM leaders have been examining a number of matters, including Haiti’s progress towards national recovery and development; progress in the implementation of the CARICOM Single Market and Economy; and issues that emanated from the recently held G20 Summit in Canada.
Yesterday, a sub-committee of the Heads of Government met and discussed external trade.
The nine-member Barbados delegation is expected home tomorrow. (BGIS) (Nation News)