The Bar­keep­ers & Op­er­a­tors As­so­ci­a­tion of Trinidad and To­ba­go (BOATT) is urg­ing oth­er stake­hold­ers in the hos­pi­tal­i­ty in­dus­try to fol­low their lead and main­tain open lines of com­mu­ni­ca­tion with the au­thor­i­ties, as the in­dus­try con­tin­ues to work on re­cov­er­ing from the eco­nom­ic im­pact of COVID-19.

In a re­lease is­sued to­day, BOATT points at fruit­ful dis­cus­sions with the health and fi­nance min­istries on a way for­ward.

“The Bar­keep­ers and Op­er­a­tors As­so­ci­a­tion of Trinidad and To­ba­go will like to take this op­por­tu­ni­ty to thank the Min­is­ter of Health The Ho­n­ourable Ter­rance Deyals­ingh, CMO Dr Roshan Parsaram, Dr Av­ery Hinds and Min­is­ter of Fi­nance The Ho­n­ourable Colm Im­bert, for giv­ing us the op­por­tu­ni­ty to meet and have con­struc­tive and mean­ing­ful di­a­log on the way for­ward for the bar in­dus­try.  We look for­ward to meet­ing with you all again in the com­ing weeks in an at­tempt to ac­cess fi­nan­cial sup­port and de­ter­mine the way for­ward and for the safe re­open­ing of our in­dus­try,” the BOATT re­lease stat­ed.

BOATT al­so com­mend­ed the Trinidad and To­ba­go Pro­mot­ers’ As­so­ci­a­tion (TTPA) and sev­er­al Restau­ran­teurs for their re­cent state­ments on re­stric­tions with­in the En­ter­tain­ment and Food and Bev­er­age sec­tor.

“The bar in­dus­try is the heart­beat of Trinidad and To­ba­go’s tourism sec­tor and is an in­te­gral part of our cul­ture,” BOATT said.  “We have pro­vid­ed the stage through­out our twin is­land state to new and ris­ing artists to show­case their tal­ent, of which most have de­vel­oped in­to in­ter­na­tion­al artists.”

The lob­by group not­ed: “While pro­mot­ers pro­vide a stage for our artists and the ‘vibes’ for our peo­ple dur­ing car­ni­val time, we the bar own­ers pro­vide the same op­por­tu­ni­ty and ‘vibes’ 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 365 days a year to our lo­cal artists and tal­ent free of charge.”

BOATT al­so stat­ed that while hit hard by the pan­dem­ic, and anx­ious to re­build, their in­dus­try will not do so at the ex­pense of cit­i­zens health and safe­ty.

“Since March 17th, 2020, due to the Coro­n­avirus, bar own­ers and em­ploy­ees have been left to fend for our­selves.  We have been bear­ing—and will con­tin­ue to bear—the bur­den for the health and safe­ty of all cit­i­zens, and the en­tire pop­u­la­tion of Trinidad and To­ba­go,” the re­lease said.

BOATT al­so is urg­ing “all oth­er stake­hold­ers to en­gage the rel­e­vant au­thor­i­ties in a bid to win the war against COVID-19”, stat­ing that on­ly to­geth­er will this war be won.