The Trinidad and To­ba­go Man­u­fac­tur­ers’ As­so­ci­a­tion (TTMA) has said that it notes "with some con­cern" that il­lic­it trade ac­tiv­i­ties con­tin­ue to ad­verse­ly af­fect the coun­try’s so­cial and eco­nom­ic progress as ev­i­denced by the in­crease in vi­o­lent crime.

The TTMA, in a news re­lease, said that re­cent­ly, Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley said the dra­mat­ic es­ca­la­tion in vi­o­lent crime is now at cri­sis-lev­el, and he ad­mit­ted there were plans to de­clare it a pub­lic health is­sue.

"This does not au­gur well for the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty, who stands to in­cur an in­crease cost to safe­guard their busi­ness op­er­a­tions and them­selves against this es­ca­la­tion," the TTMA said.

TTMA’s Pres­i­dent, Tri­cia Coos­al said she agrees that vi­o­lent crime is at an ex­tra-or­di­nary high and un­bear­able lev­el and calls for the Gov­ern­ment to en­sure our bor­ders are ad­e­quate­ly pa­trolled to specif­i­cal­ly pre­vent il­lic­it trad­ed ac­tiv­i­ties, which are linked to se­ri­ous crime from oc­cur­ring.

“Our cur­rent porous bor­ders al­low for a mag­ni­tude of is­sues, es­pe­cial­ly the traf­fick­ing of nar­cotics, hu­mans, weapons, cig­a­rettes, al­co­hol, wildlife and phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals. While the TTMA’s Il­lic­it Trade Desk has been ac­tive in lob­by­ing against the smug­gling of sub-stan­dard and harm­ful goods, the il­le­gal act con­tin­ues. We at the TTMA are in­creas­ing­ly wor­ried over the far-reach­ing ef­fects it may have on our econ­o­my, which is still strug­gling to re­turn to “nor­mal” ac­tiv­i­ty, giv­en the back­ground of the Rus­sia/Ukraine war, the pan­dem­ic and the dis­rup­tion of ship­ping routes,” she said.

She not­ed the preva­lence of Free Trade Zones and Spe­cial Eco­nom­ic Zones, which can cause a myr­i­ad of is­sues as it re­lates to the en­try of il­le­gal guns and am­mu­ni­tion, if left unchecked and un­su­per­vised.

Coos­al added, “Ac­cord­ing to the Strate­gic Ser­vices Agency (SSA), there are ap­prox­i­mate­ly 12,000 il­le­gal firearms in Trinidad and To­ba­go. TTMA be­lieves with greater cross col­lab­o­ra­tion among na­tion­al se­cu­ri­ty agen­cies, in­clud­ing the Coast Guard, the Port Au­thor­i­ty, Cus­toms and Ex­cise Di­vi­sion and the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice – this num­ber can be de­creased. Par­tic­u­lar­ly con­cern­ing to the As­so­ci­a­tion is the re­moval of firearms out of the hands of crim­i­nals who use them for ne­far­i­ous pur­pos­es. We need co­or­di­nat­ed and strate­gic ac­tion.”

Coos­al ex­plained the like­ly im­pact of the in­sur­gent crime wave on leisure and busi­ness vis­i­tors.

“Re­cent­ly, we saw the brazen block­age of our na­tion’s road­ways, which is a com­mon oc­cur­rence. This not on­ly af­fects lo­cal busi­ness op­er­a­tions and com­muters, but al­so makes many of our busi­ness in­vestors ex­treme­ly anx­ious. Tourists and oth­er vis­i­tors to our is­land are be­ing warned to stay away from cer­tain ar­eas and this is detri­men­tal to a pos­i­tive eco­nom­ic out­look.”

The TTMA said the im­pact of il­lic­it trade un­der­mines the so­cial sta­bil­i­ty and wel­fare of com­mu­ni­ties, and di­verts op­por­tu­ni­ties from the le­gal econ­o­my.

“Il­le­gal trade in quar­ry­ing, al­co­hol, to­bac­co, phar­ma­ceu­ti­cals, wildlife, cy­ber­crime and mon­ey laun­der­ing threat­ens eco­nom­ic growth and de­vel­op­ment. There is ev­i­dence to sug­gest it al­so pre­vents the eq­ui­table dis­tri­b­u­tion of pub­lic goods. Coun­tries and com­pa­nies lose rev­enue, in­vest­ments, mar­ket op­por­tu­ni­ties and cit­i­zens be­come dis­en­fran­chised and ex­posed to health risk and de­prived of fi­nan­cial se­cu­ri­ty,” Coos­al said.

Coos­al con­tin­ued, “We stand in sol­i­dar­i­ty with the Gov­ern­ment of Trinidad and To­ba­go, the Min­istry of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty and the Trinidad and To­ba­go Po­lice Ser­vice. We un­der­stand the mon­u­men­tal task they are faced with every day. From a TTMA per­spec­tive, crime needs to be looked at holis­ti­cal­ly, in­clu­sive of il­lic­it trade ac­tiv­i­ties.”

Re­flect­ing on the Prime Min­is­ter’s stance on crime, Coos­al in­di­cat­ed, “In re­cent times, we have seen an up­surge in home in­va­sions, mur­ders and a gun re­lat­ed ac­tiv­i­ties against law abid­ing cit­i­zens. TTMA stands 100% be­hind the Ho­n­ourable Prime Min­is­ter as he de­clares the high crime wave a pub­lic health is­sue.”