ELIZ­A­BETH GON­ZA­LES

GML Cor­re­spon­dent

In a New Year’s mes­sage shared via so­cial me­dia, Chief Sec­re­tary Far­ley Au­gus­tine used a vi­sion board style to high­light his ma­jor goals for the com­ing year.

“Our de­vel­op­ment slo­gan is, ‘Great­est lit­tle is­land on the plan­et’,” he said. “This is a pow­er­ful de­c­la­ra­tion, and we com­mit to do­ing the work to en­sure that she be­comes more beau­ti­ful.”

Food se­cu­ri­ty re­mains a top pri­or­i­ty for 2025. Au­gus­tine an­nounced ini­tia­tives such as the mega farm­ing project and the To­ba­go Agribusi­ness Re­search In­sti­tute.

“These ini­tia­tives promise to be game chang­ers that will em­pow­er our peo­ple and even­tu­al­ly help us to build a more self-suf­fi­cient lit­tle is­land,” he ex­plained.

His ad­min­is­tra­tion al­so plans to im­prove fish­ing fa­cil­i­ties and pro­vide se­cu­ri­ty de­vices for fish­er­folk.

Health care is an­oth­er key fo­cus area. Au­gus­tine said the THA would pur­chase an MRI and CT scan­ner for the Scar­bor­ough Hos­pi­tal and re­place the age­ing hy­per­bar­ic cham­ber at Rox­bor­ough. He al­so high­light­ed plans for a new car­diac care pro­gramme, a fleet of am­bu­lances, and a ‘ba­by box ini­tia­tive’ for new par­ents.

“We un­der­stand that a healthy To­bag­on­ian pop­u­la­tion will lead vi­brant and ful­fill­ing lives,” Au­gus­tine said.

Ed­u­ca­tion will see ma­jor changes in 2025.

“We en­vi­sion an in­clu­sive sys­tem for our is­land,” said Au­gus­tine, adding that schools would re­main open af­ter hours for com­mu­ni­ty learn­ing un­der the Com­mu­ni­ty Im­pact Pro­gramme. Plans al­so in­clude an ear­ly child­hood care cen­tre and schol­ar­ships for stu­dents study­ing fields like lo­gis­tics, sup­ply chain man­age­ment, and tourism.

The Chief Sec­re­tary not­ed that tourism is set to ex­pand, with im­prove­ments planned for pop­u­lar beach­es such as Pi­geon Point and Store Bay. Au­gus­tine al­so promised new ho­tel de­vel­op­ments and fes­ti­vals, in­clud­ing the To­ba­go Tourism and Souls Fes­ti­val.

“We are ex­treme­ly ex­cit­ed to im­prove the is­land’s tourism prod­uct,” he said.

Au­ton­o­my re­mains a pri­or­i­ty. Au­gus­tine said his ad­min­is­tra­tion will push for greater au­ton­o­my for the To­ba­go House of As­sem­bly and con­tin­ue ef­forts in digi­ti­sa­tion.

“This is more than just a vi­sion. It is al­so an in­vi­ta­tion for you to dream with us, to con­tribute and to be part of your is­land’s trans­for­ma­tion,” he said.

He urged To­bag­o­ni­ans to work to­geth­er in 2025:

“To­ba­go, our vi­sion is clear. The time is now. We must be re­lent­less in turn­ing this vi­sion in­to re­al­i­ty. Hap­py New Year, To­ba­go.”