As the gen­er­al elec­tion cam­paign reach­es its cli­max, and as po­lit­i­cal par­ties dish out promis­es, the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty of T&T is con­cerned they are not hear­ing enough about par­ties’ plans for the econ­o­my.

The Busi­ness Guardian spoke to sev­er­al en­ti­ties which all said those run­ning for of­fice are yet to de­tail their eco­nom­ic poli­cies for the crit­i­cal years that lie ahead.

Pres­i­dent of the Ch­agua­nas Cham­ber of In­dus­try and Com­merce (CCIC), Bal­dath Ma­haraj, said giv­en the pro­ject­ed short­fall in en­er­gy rev­enues and the Drag­on gas deal “this pos­es sig­nif­i­cant risks to na­tion­al in­come and for­eign ex­change earn­ings.”

Ma­haraj fur­ther said it was a top­ic the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty want­ed to hear more about from po­lit­i­cal par­ties on the cam­paign trail.

“As it stands, there has been in­suf­fi­cient dis­cus­sion on these crit­i­cal is­sues, and we urge all po­lit­i­cal par­ties to be trans­par­ent and for­ward-think­ing in their pro­pos­als,” he added.

The CCIC pres­i­dent called for prac­ti­cal eco­nom­ic plan­ning “ and a gov­ern­ment that is will­ing to work col­lab­o­ra­tive­ly with the pri­vate sec­tor.”

It’s a point the Con­fed­er­a­tion of Re­gion­al Busi­ness Cham­bers (CR­BC) chair­man, Vivek Char­ran, em­pha­sised in an in­ter­view on CNC3’s Morn­ing Brew pro­gramme on Tues­day.

He said, “Amidst the noise, we are lis­ten­ing to see what the fu­ture is be­cause we are in an elec­tion pe­ri­od now. What is crit­i­cal­ly im­por­tant is pol­i­cy. Pol­i­cy is go­ing to de­ter­mine stew­ard of the econ­o­my. Pol­i­cy is go­ing to de­ter­mine what is go­ing to hap­pen with re­gard to our cur­rent crime sit­u­a­tion. Are we go­ing to con­tin­ue to be in a per­pet­u­al state of emer­gency?”

Ki­ran Singh, Greater San Fer­nan­do Cham­ber of Com­merce (GS­FCC) pres­i­dent al­so stressed the im­por­tance of deal­ing with the crime fac­tor to ad­dress broad­er con­cerns with­in the econ­o­my.

“We can­not af­ford to let the crim­i­nals con­tin­ue in­def­i­nite­ly on their crime wave. The SOE pro­duced pos­i­tive re­sults that should be cap­i­talised on. We haven’t heard on how this will con­tin­ue af­ter the elec­tion,” he said.

Char­ran said he learnt last week that To­ba­go busi­ness­es have been rene­go­ti­at­ing their loans and their fi­nances with their banks.

“That is hap­pen­ing across the board,” Char­ran said adding, “Am I hear­ing a lot of op­tions on the ta­ble?”

The head of CR­BC al­so slammed a lack of ac­count­abil­i­ty in light of the changes to the Cab­i­net when Prime Min­is­ter Stu­art Young was sworn in­to of­fice on March 17.

He ex­plained, “The past Min­is­ter of Fi­nance has dis­ap­peared. The past Min­is­ter of Na­tion­al Se­cu­ri­ty has dis­ap­peared. There is no di­rect ac­count­abil­i­ty for the last 10 years of stew­ard­ship of the econ­o­my and crime.”

Cre­ate space for SMEs

Char­ran em­pha­sised it as crit­i­cal for the in­com­ing gov­ern­ment to fo­cus on small and medi­um-sized en­ter­pris­es (SMEs).

“One can­not tax an ail­ing econ­o­my in­to re­cov­ery,” he told the Morn­ing Brew pro­gramme.

He added the gov­ern­ment can­not tax SMEs that are al­ready strug­gling with debt “and hope there will be some re­cov­ery.”

In­stead, he wants the next gov­ern­ment to work close­ly with SMEs, adding, “I would ask that who­ev­er wins the elec­tion, let the fo­cus be on, or cre­ate a space for SMEs, and that space must be one that al­lows them to breathe and catch them­selves af­ter the lock­down pe­ri­od, where, for two years we were un­able to op­er­ate and earn an in­come.”

Fyz­abad Cham­ber of Com­merce pres­i­dent, Ang­ie Jairam, who added her voice to the grow­ing cho­rus of busi­ness cham­bers al­so called for as­sis­tance for SMEs. “The gov­ern­ment must take in­to con­sid­er­a­tion the im­pacts of com­mu­ni­ties when these SME’s thrive. We em­ploy per­sons, we con­tribute great­ly to com­mu­ni­ty build­ing and the econ­o­my. Busi­ness in­vest­ment comes on­ly when there is con­fi­dence in the sys­tem. We ex­pand with a trust­ed sys­tem. It helps us in­no­vate. There­fore, gov­ern­ment’s poli­cies in every as­pect in the ease of do­ing busi­ness is im­por­tant to al­low busi­ness­es to grow and the wider coun­try to grow,” she said.

Singh added that his cham­ber want­ed to hear from the oth­er par­ties on their plans to ease the forex frus­tra­tions for SMEs.

He said the Greater San Fer­nan­do Cham­ber of Com­merce was of the opin­ion that a de­val­u­a­tion would cause im­me­di­ate in­fla­tion and al­so put up­ward pres­sure on salaries and wages.

“Can we af­ford that at this time?” he asked.

On March 25, Prime Min­is­ter Stu­art Young met with mem­bers of the bank­ing sec­tor to forge a way for­ward with re­gards to T&T’s for­eign ex­change woes.

De­val­u­a­tion of the TT dol­lar

The de­val­u­a­tion of the TT dol­lar has be­come a ma­jor po­lit­i­cal sub­ject on the cam­paign trail.

On April 2, Young told a crowd of sup­port­ers at a po­lit­i­cal ral­ly on Har­ris Prom­e­nade in San Fer­nan­do that should the UNC win the Gen­er­al Elec­tions, the par­ty would de­val­ue the TT dol­lar to US$1 = TT$15. The Op­po­si­tion Leader, Kam­la Per­sad-Bisses­sar, re­spond­ed a day lat­er deny­ing she had any plans of a de­val­u­a­tion.

Ma­haraj said the Ch­agua­nas Cham­ber has tak­en a de­fin­i­tive stance against de­valu­ing the TT dol­lar.

He said, “De­val­u­a­tion would place fur­ther strain on im­port-re­liant busi­ness­es, es­ca­late the cost of liv­ing, and risk in­creased in­fla­tion with­out guar­an­tee­ing eco­nom­ic com­pet­i­tive­ness. We be­lieve that the way for­ward lies in sound fis­cal dis­ci­pline, in­vest­ment in pro­duc­tiv­i­ty, and the cre­ation of an en­abling en­vi­ron­ment for busi­ness­es to thrive.”

When ques­tioned on her po­si­tion on whether the TT dol­lar should be de­val­ued, Jairam said, “Cut­ting un­nec­es­sary spend­ing and in­vest­ing in de­vel­op­ment and at­tract­ing in­vestors in key sec­tors should help us avoid the de­val­u­a­tion. Man­age­ment is im­por­tant for our sur­vival.”

Mean­while, the Greater Tu­na­puna Cham­ber of In­dus­try and Com­merce (GT­CIC) ex­ec­u­tive di­rec­tor, Ja­son Roach called for more so­lu­tions and less bac­cha­na­lia on the cam­paign trail.

He said, “The is­sue of de­val­u­a­tion is a se­ri­ous one, par­tic­u­lar­ly in this en­vi­ron­ment of un­pre­dictabil­i­ty with ref­er­ence to the in­ter­na­tion­al tar­iff war will be throw­ing gaso­line on fire. Based on what we are see­ing in­ter­na­tion­al­ly, we need to be pru­dent and wise.”

Pol­i­cy ac­tion need­ed

In the height of the elec­tion sea­son, promis­es are aplen­ty, how­ev­er, Ma­haraj said ac­tion is what is crit­i­cal­ly need­ed at this time.

He added, “At present, busi­ness­es—par­tic­u­lar­ly small and medi­um-sized en­ter­pris­es—con­tin­ue to face se­ri­ous chal­lenges. These in­clude lim­it­ed ac­cess to for­eign ex­change, de­layed VAT re­funds, ris­ing crime in com­mer­cial dis­tricts, in­ef­fi­cient pub­lic ser­vices, and bur­den­some bu­reau­cra­cy. While we wel­come promis­es to im­prove the ease of do­ing busi­ness, what is need­ed now are clear, mea­sur­able pol­i­cy ac­tions and gen­uine stake­hold­er en­gage­ment.

“Ad­di­tion­al­ly, there must be a na­tion­al strat­e­gy to boost for­eign ex­change earn­ings—not on­ly through the en­er­gy sec­tor, but through di­ver­si­fi­ca­tion in­to tourism, man­u­fac­tur­ing, agro-pro­cess­ing, and ex­port ser­vices.”

The busi­ness cham­bers added they would con­tin­ue to lis­ten at­ten­tive­ly to the plans the po­lit­i­cal par­ties have for busi­ness­es and the econ­o­my, but is adamant ac­tion is need­ed to help SMEs thrive again.

Elec­tion promis­es so far:

UNC to in­crease com­pen­sa­tion of pub­lic sec­tor em­ploy­ees by no less than 10 per cent

UNC to low­er cor­po­rate tax­es by five per cent ini­tial­ly

UNC to re­move VAT on 7,000 ba­sic food items

PNM to re­move VAT from school uni­forms

PNM to re­move tax­es from pub­lic ser­vants’ pen­sions

PNM to dou­ble food cards

Pa­tri­ot­ic Front to in­crease min­i­mum wage

Pa­tri­ot­ic Front to re­move VAT from es­sen­tial food items and crack down on price goug­ing