One year af­ter T&T re­port­ed its first case of COVID-19, hun­dreds of busi­ness­es have been forced to per­ma­nent­ly close their doors, while oth­ers that have re­mained open con­tin­ue to see a dras­tic fall in sales. Hun­dreds of peo­ple have been laid off while oth­ers have been asked to work few­er hours as em­ploy­ers strug­gle to keep them on their pay­roll as they face their worst cri­sis in decades.

The sta­tis­tics paint a de­press­ing pic­ture. 25 per cent of busi­ness­es in San Fer­nan­do and the en­vi­rons have been closed per­ma­nent­ly. Ten per cent of busi­ness­es in the San­gre Grande area have closed their doors while sales in that area have fall­en by 35 per cent. In some oth­er ar­eas, sales have al­most col­lapsed by 50 per cent. Stores in some malls across the coun­try have had to shut their doors, leav­ing what was once a vi­brant en­ter­tain­ment cen­tre look­ing like ghost towns in some in­stances.

Closed bor­ders that re­strict trade, the short­age of forex, lock­downs on some op­er­a­tions such as pubs, lim­it­ed op­er­at­ing hours for bars and strin­gent COVID reg­u­la­tions on how pa­trons can be served have put busi­ness­es un­der pres­sure.

CEO, T&T Cham­ber of In­dus­try and Com­merce Gabriel Faria has es­ti­mat­ed that at least 1,000 busi­ness­es closed their doors since T&T test­ed its first COVID-19 case one year ago.

He not­ed that he is not bas­ing this fig­ure on em­pir­i­cal da­ta but it is his “per­cep­tion” af­ter speak­ing to busi­ness own­ers through­out the coun­try.

The oth­er sta­tis­tics he gave al­so re­flects the poor state of the econ­o­my.

He be­lieves that un­em­ploy­ment is “in ex­cess” of ten per cent. To make it worse, he said, peo­ple are work­ing but the num­ber of hours have been cut so they take home less pay.

“There is re­duced ag­gre­gate de­mand so that con­sumers are not spend­ing and busi­ness­es have to re­duce their costs and they are us­ing dif­fer­ent types of mech­a­nisms to keep their em­ploy­ees em­ployed.”

Some sec­tors are do­ing worse than oth­ers, he added.

This is what High Street, San Fernando looked like during business hours on January 13. Normally one of the busiest streets in he South, filled with shoppers, pedestrian and vehicular traffic, this area has now become a virtual ghost town.

KRISTIAN DE SILVA

"At the mo­ment, restau­rants, casi­nos and bars are most im­pact­ed and it is in these sec­tors where un­em­ploy­ment and un­der­em­ploy­ment are at the high­est," he said.

He al­so es­ti­mates that T&T’s GDP de­cline in 2021 was at least ten per cent, one of the steep­est de­clines in T&T’s econ­o­my in the last 40 years.

Now, con­cerns about the pace with which the Gov­ern­ment will be in­tro­duc­ing the vac­cines have added to the grim sit­u­a­tion.

Faria said the Cham­ber’s mem­bers are con­cerned about the time it takes to ac­quire the vac­cines.

For the econ­o­my to ful­ly re­open and to start grow­ing again, he said there needs to be an “ag­gres­sive” vac­ci­na­tion cam­paign which he hopes will hap­pen be­fore the end of 2021.

Coun­tries around the world have al­so been ex­pe­ri­enc­ing eco­nom­ic prob­lems.

But af­ter most economies world­wide ex­pe­ri­enced neg­a­tive eco­nom­ic growth in 2020 as a re­sult of COVID, the roll­out of vac­cines is giv­ing a boost to coun­tries as it of­fers the promise of more nor­mal trav­el, en­ter­tain­ment and busi­ness op­tions lat­er in the year.

In the Unit­ed States, the world’s largest econ­o­my, Gold­man Sachs is pre­dict­ing Gross Do­mes­tic Prod­uct (GDP) growth of 6.9 per cent, the fastest growth since 1984.

Chi­na, the world’s sec­ond-largest econ­o­my is ex­pect­ed to see GDP growth of 6.9 per cent.

In Eu­rope, Greece will be ac­cept­ing tourists who are vac­ci­nat­ed as they open their bor­ders.

Mean­while, econ­o­mist Dr Ronald Ramkissoon said what T&T and the world have been go­ing through is of a "his­toric pro­por­tion.

"We have not had any dis­ease like this in our life­time. Maybe the last time was 1918. This glob­al cri­sis has im­pact­ed most coun­tries."

This health cri­sis has had an im­pact on what some econ­o­mists call the hu­man cap­i­tal that is the abil­i­ty to work and to pro­duce.

He is not sur­prised that busi­ness own­ers are in such deep dis­tress as he said the way the econ­o­my is struc­tured, busi­ness­es feed off the wealth gen­er­at­ed by oil and gas. The prob­lem now is that most of that rev­enue is gone.

He said the re­cov­ery of the T&T econ­o­my will be pred­i­cat­ed on how many peo­ple are vac­ci­nat­ed. That will then in­flu­ence how quick­ly the econ­o­my is ful­ly re­opened.

"I would not be sur­prised that by the end of the year, I ex­pect that com­pa­nies will be do­ing an as­sess­ment of where they are in terms of sales and cost op­er­a­tions. I ex­pect that by ear­ly next year we can ex­pect the sit­u­a­tion to im­prove and to see a turn­around in em­ploy­ment."

CHAL­LENGES

Busi­ness lead­ers through­out T&T shared some of the chal­lenges that they face.

Eastern Business Merchants Association President Ricardo Mohammed.

East­ern Busi­ness and Mer­chants As­so­ci­a­tion

Pres­i­dent of the East­ern Busi­ness and Mer­chants As­so­ci­a­tion (EBMA) Ri­car­do Mo­hammed, ex­press­ing con­cern about busi­ness­es in the San­gre Grande area, es­ti­mat­ed that more than 30 per cent of the bars have closed down over the last year.

"We hope that the Gov­ern­ment changes its poli­cies with re­gard to bar own­ers. They should put a struc­ture in place sim­i­lar to the restau­rants to op­er­ate with a cer­tain num­ber of ta­ble set­tings and have them abide by COVID-19 reg­u­la­tions."

Mo­hammed al­so spoke about dis­mal sales in the re­tail sec­tor. Di­vali, Christ­mas and Car­ni­val are usu­al­ly pe­ri­ods where con­sumers spend freely, how­ev­er giv­en peo­ple’s loss of pur­chas­ing pow­er busi­ness­es are ex­pe­ri­enc­ing a steep de­cline in sales in the area, he said.

"We are fac­ing the first quar­ter of 2021 with a sig­nif­i­cant de­crease in sales. We are ex­pe­ri­enc­ing up to 35 per cent de­cline in sales dai­ly from our mem­bers. There is no cash flow. Peo­ple’s spend­ing pow­er has been sig­nif­i­cant­ly re­duced."

Speak­ing on the need to ur­gent­ly vac­ci­nate cit­i­zens, Mo­hammed said the longer the Gov­ern­ment takes to do this, the longer it will take to re­ac­ti­vate the econ­o­my.

He said the Gov­ern­ment should have been more proac­tive in try­ing to ac­cess vac­cines for the coun­try.

"The mere fact that vac­cines could have been shipped to this re­gion and we didn’t take steps to en­sure that a sig­nif­i­cant num­ber of these vac­cines reached T&T, begs the ques­tion, what is re­al­ly be­ing done? The world lead­ers are say­ing to re­open the world econ­o­my we need to have vac­ci­na­tion pro­grammes. Many busi­ness­es are un­sure of what will hap­pen for the rest of the year."

Chaguanas Chamber of Commerce President Vishnu Charran.

SHIRLEY BAHADUR

Ch­agua­nas Busi­ness Cham­ber

Pres­i­dent of the Ch­agua­nas Busi­ness Cham­ber Vish­nu Char­ran de­scribed the last year as "trau­mat­ic" for the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty and the wider na­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty.

"We are see­ing busi­ness­es fold­ing up and some down­siz­ing. If the Gov­ern­ment does not step in to do some­thing, you will see lay­offs. To avoid lay­offs, busi­ness own­ers are just cut­ting back the hours em­ploy­ees work."

Char­ran said he has been speak­ing to busi­ness own­ers in Ch­agua­nas and oth­er parts of the coun­try and there is a con­sen­sus that there has been a fall in sales over the last month.

The busi­ness­man said the Gov­ern­ment has to im­ple­ment a strong pro­gramme to im­ple­ment the roll­out of vac­cines and be­gin to re­open the econ­o­my as soon as pos­si­ble.

"If that does not hap­pen, there will be more cuts of work­ing hours for em­ploy­ees, more loss of jobs and it is trag­ic what will hap­pen. Even if the coun­try be­gins to re­open we will not see an im­me­di­ate re­cov­ery, it will take time to re­build. I don’t think we will see an uptick in busi­ness un­til next year."

Confederation of Regional Business chambers co-ordinator Jai Leladharsingh

SHIRLEY BAHADUR

Con­fed­er­a­tion of Re­gion­al Busi­ness Cham­bers

Co­or­di­na­tor of the Con­fed­er­a­tion of Re­gion­al Busi­ness Cham­bers (CR­BC) Jai Lelad­hars­ingh es­ti­mat­ed that 700 busi­ness­es in the con­fed­er­a­tion have closed over the last year.

He said most busi­ness­es are op­er­at­ing on a quar­ter of their rev­enues.

"Busi­ness peo­ple have been dip­ping in­to their sav­ings to pay salaries from their own mon­ey and to pay bills."

Lelad­hars­ingh said the Gov­ern­ment must take quick ac­tion to have the coun­try vac­ci­nat­ed.

"The Gov­ern­ment must step up their game and put a lot of fo­cus on ob­tain­ing the vac­cine as an emer­gency step. The Gov­ern­ment must un­der­stand there is a cri­sis, a deep cri­sis. Then we can work to­geth­er to bring about an eco­nom­ic re­cov­ery."

Anil Maraj, Barkeepers and Operators Association of T&T Public Relations Officer.

Bar­keep­ers and Op­er­a­tors As­so­ci­a­tion of T&T

Di­rec­tor, Bar­keep­ers and Op­er­a­tors As­so­ci­a­tion of T&T Anil Maraj es­ti­mat­ed that out of 3,000 bars in T&T, 60 of them closed per­ma­nent­ly. Al­so, there were 40 to 50 bars that changed own­er­ship as pre­vi­ous own­ers could no longer man­age those busi­ness­es.

Maraj said more than 300 bar em­ploy­ees have lost their jobs over the last year and he was sure that of the re­main­ing work­ers most of them op­er­ate on re­duced in­comes.

Maraj pro­ject­ed that the econ­o­my and specif­i­cal­ly bars will not be ful­ly re­opened un­til enough peo­ple are vac­ci­nat­ed.

Gas­par­il­lo Busi­ness Cham­ber

Pres­i­dent of the Gas­par­il­lo Busi­ness Cham­ber Anil Ran­jit said well-known busi­ness­es like Lin­da’s Bak­ery and Burg­er King have moved out of the area re­cent­ly.

Ran­jit re­count­ed a con­ver­sa­tion he had with a co­conut ven­dor in his area who said that he now has to take one week to sell the num­ber of co­conuts he used to sell in two days. A gy­ro ven­dor told him that his sales have fall­en by 50 per cent over the last year, he said.

To­ba­go Cham­ber of Com­merce

Pres­i­dent of the To­ba­go Cham­ber of Com­merce Mar­tin George said busi­ness­es in To­ba­go, on the oth­er hand, have been ben­e­fit­ing from closed bor­ders as many Trinida­di­ans have re­sort­ed to go­ing to the sis­ter isle for va­ca­tion.

He said this has pos­i­tive­ly in­creased mar­ket ac­tiv­i­ty there. He said taxis, restau­rants, ho­tels and oth­er sec­tors have been get­ting busi­ness from this and they ap­pre­ci­ate that.

George hopes that To­bag­o­ni­ans will be giv­en pri­or­i­ty in the vac­ci­na­tion roll­out.

“Giv­en To­ba­go’s pop­u­la­tion of 50,000 and if they do the vac­ci­na­tion of To­ba­go first and they cre­ate a bub­ble and the pop­u­la­tion ful­ly in­oc­u­lat­ed, then To­ba­go can be opened up for in­ter­na­tion­al busi­ness.”

Greater San Fer­nan­do Busi­ness Cham­ber

Pres­i­dent of the Greater San Fer­nan­do Busi­ness Cham­ber lament­ed the 25 per cent of busi­ness­es in down­town San Fer­nan­do and sur­round­ing ar­eas that have per­ma­nent­ly closed their doors.

Ari­ma Busi­ness As­so­ci­a­tion

Reval Chater­goon, pres­i­dent of the Ari­ma Busi­ness As­so­ci­a­tion point­ed out that busi­ness­es con­tin­ue to close dai­ly in Ari­ma be­cause of the eco­nom­ic de­pres­sion in the coun­try.

Ex­cel­lent Stores

In a state­ment to the Sun­day Guardian, Ex­cel­lent Stores, which has al­ready closed down three of its out­lets, said the dis­tri­b­u­tion of vac­cines was a wel­come sign for both the lo­cal and in­ter­na­tion­al com­mu­ni­ty.

"It shows some light at the end of the tun­nel. With glob­al vac­cine tri­als in chil­dren still in its very ear­ly stages, the glob­al dif­fer­en­tial in the vac­cine avail­abil­i­ty and ad­min­is­tra­tion, we should ex­pect a con­tin­u­a­tion of the new nor­mal for the near fu­ture here in T&T as trans­mis­sion of the virus to the un­vac­ci­nat­ed pop­u­la­tion would still be a con­cern.

"For Ex­cel­lent Stores, the strat­e­gy re­mains on track to con­tin­ue to in­vest and en­hance our on­line pres­ence both lo­cal­ly and re­gion­al­ly, redi­rect re­sources to op­ti­mise and en­hance our in-store ex­pe­ri­ences and ex­pand our ex­port part­ner­ships with our lo­cal sup­pli­ers to re­gion­al mar­kets and con­tribute to the in­crease in in­ter-Cari­com trade that has al­ready start­ed.

"As the vac­cines con­tin­ue to roll out glob­al­ly, we ex­pect to be ready for a 2022 in­ter­na­tion­al trav­el boom with pent up de­mand for sun­ny des­ti­na­tions and the pos­i­tive eco­nom­ic im­pacts it has on both the lo­cal and re­gion­al economies."

Too much has­sle for gov­ern­ment-backed loans and mora­to­ri­ums

Mo­hammed, speak­ing about the Gov­ern­ment-backed loans and mora­to­ri­ums that were of­fered to busi­ness­es in 2020 at the height of the lock­down, said these pack­ages were not as at­trac­tive as they were made out to be and so none of the EM­BA’s mem­bers ac­cessed the loans.

"The mere fact that more in­ter­est had to be paid in some sit­u­a­tions would have been more dif­fi­cult for some busi­ness­es. The banks gave op­tions of in­creas­ing loans over the same pe­ri­od or they would have ex­tend­ed the du­ra­tion of the loan with ad­di­tion­al in­stal­ments at the same rate. In essence, it was not a true ben­e­fit."

Maraj said the vast ma­jor­i­ty of bars did not qual­i­fy for the loans that the banks were of­fer­ing.

"There is VAT reg­is­tra­tion. Most of the bars do not make the rev­enue and in­come to be reg­is­tered for VAT. So the bar own­ers did not meet those cri­te­ria. The Min­is­ter of Fi­nance met with us and said he did not see that as a prob­lem. But re­mem­ber, it was of­fered through the banks and they had their own cri­te­ria."

Maraj, mean­while, said the Gov­ern­ment had promised their in­dus­try a $10 mil­lion pay­out late last year and they are still wait­ing for the mon­ey. Once dis­bursed, he said, this will be used to as­sist em­ploy­ees as it is sim­i­lar to a salary re­lief grant.

Chater­goon said that the mora­to­ri­ums of­fered by banks were not worth it.

"Mora­to­ri­ums do not come free. To get those loans the amount of hoops that you have to jump through it was near­ly im­pos­si­ble. A busi­ness own­er al­so had to get a NIS com­pli­ant cer­tifi­cate. To get that, an au­di­tor had to come an au­dit. That could have tak­en months. The mass­es of busi­ness could not have got­ten it."