Private sector investment key in economic recovery

The next ten years will be critical for the Caribbean, not just because of the period that we are currently engaged in on account of the COVID-19 pandemic, but because it will define what the Caribbean will look like, in terms of investment going forward.

Patrick Antoine, Caribbean Private Sector Organisation (CPSO) Representative suggested the above, as he spoke on the topic, “Private Sector Leading Growth in the Region in a post COVID-19 world”, during the fifth webinar of the FAO’s COVID-19 and Food Systems Series. That series was organised by the FAO Regional Office for Latin America and the Caribbean, in collaboration with the CARICOM Secretariat and it focused on the theme, “Enabling agricultural investment in the Caribbean, for an effective response and post-COVID-19 recovery”.

The CPSO representative stressed that the involvement of the private sector is key in helping to drive growth, employment and economic activity going forward and is certainly part of the solution that is needed, as countries seek to emerge from the pandemic. Antoine stressed that investing in agriculture continues to be a strong strategic move and he spoke of a need for mechanisms to provide blended financing options for the agri-industry in particular, as well as for more government and private sector joint funding.

“We need to understand that our capital and finance markets are extremely underdeveloped. There is an opportunity for government to use some of its borrowing power at this time and blend that with private sector funding,” he said.

“To finance agriculture we need to have more instruments; commercial bank loans will not do it. We need to have a regional stock exchange, we need to have a CARICOM stock exchange that essentially drives private equity and removes the constraints, and we need to have a junior stock exchange like Jamaica. We would like to see that extended to agriculture,” he further stated.

He also added, “Where we are now looking into the future of COVID, we need to be concerned about driving exports, cutting imports and driving intra-regional trade. We need to do that from a perspective of private sector investment”. (RSM)