Trinidad and Tobago may not be about to surrender its credentials as the Caribbean Community’s (CARICOM) member country with the most prominent petro-imprint on its economy, up to this time, though, that said, its ambition to ‘shine’ in the regional export sector, outside of oil and gas would appear to be altogether undiminished.
Minister of Trade and Industry, Paula Gopie-Scoon, when she addressed the recent Trinidad and Tobago Manufacturers’ Association (TTMA) President’s Dinner and Award Ceremony at the Hyatt in Port of Spain, paid particular attention to the incrementally advanced credentials of the non-oil sector in the country’s overall economy over the decades. She disclosed that this year, the non-energy sector accounted for $12.6 billion of the $15.7 billion in exports in 2023. The T&T Cabinet Minister disclosed that the diversification of the country’s economy had occurred on a “phased basis” and that it was the “third phase… around the early 80s,” that had led the country to the “huge diversification in the non-energy side” which she said was influenced by “policies that the Government and the Central Bank took at that time,” which, she asserted, was attended by “great focus on supporting the private sector as an engine of growth.”
Accordingly, Gopie-Scoon was quoted in the November 15 issue of the Trinidad Express as committing the (Dr. Keith) Rowley administration to continuing to support the business sector in pursuit of the objective of fostering further growth and development of the country’s many small and medium business enterprises. Meanwhile, in urging local business enterprises to “make use of (T&T’s) commercial offices in Miami, United Kingdom, and Panama as well as the attaches in Guyana and Jamaica” to create opportunities for the growth of markets for the country’s ‘home-grown’ products, contextually, Gopie-Scoon announced that along with its pre-existing “eight Trade Missions,” Trinidad and Tobago will be establishing a further ten next year which will be run by the TTMA “in collaboration with exporTT”. Trade Missions, the Minister asserted, are key for economic growth and collaboration with other countries, under the country’s Commercial Diplomacy umbrella.
