Caribbean Trade News

Denis gets thumbs up from Dominica (August 18)<>
The acquisition by Denis O’Brien’s Digicel Group of Cingular Wireless’ Dominica operation has been agreed in principle by the island’s government. For Digicel, the development is a necessary step on the road to acquire Cingular Wireless’ entire Caribbean and Bermuda operations. Digicel agreed to acquire the businesses in June in a multimillion -dollar deal that will significantly increases the size of Digicel’s pan-Caribbean mobile network.

Trade mission to the islands (August 9)
Eleven Barbadian service companies have already confirmed their participation in upcoming  Trade Missions to St. Lucia and St. Vincent. These missions are scheduled to come off from August 29th to September 2nd.

They are being put together by the Barbados Coalition of Service Industries in conjunction with the Barbados Investment and Development Corporation.
BCSI President, Patrick Estwick, said the Coalition was enthused by the very positive response of Barbadian service providers who, by their confirmed participation in the upcoming missions have demonstrated their demonstrated their recognition of the importance of Barbados' export drive.

This is the first phase of an aggressive services export thrust by the Coalition.
Similar Missions are planned by the Coalition for Guyana and Suriname during the month of October

The Bahamas And The Caribbean As A Market For Meats ( 3rd August The Bahamas along with its Caribbean neighbours figures prominently into the global meat trade. Much of this is due to the fact that the Caribbean is a major tourism destination as the region attracts almost 20 million visitors annually from developed countries where the consumers are accustomed to eating high quality meat products.

Eastern Caribbean Poised to Decrease Trade Deficit
Leaders of the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) have unanimously asserted the need for preferential trade treatment as a precondition to signing the proposed regional single market economy. The leaders of OECS countries ( Antigua, Anguilla, Barbuda, British Virgin Islands, Dominica, Grenada, St. Lucia, St. Vincent, St. Kitts and Nevis) have expressed apprehension towards the widening trade deficit gap between their countries and the 15 nation Caribbean Community (Caricom). The Deficit has widened from US$214 million to US$418 million between 1980 and 2003, the leaders said, in a joint statement after the conclusion of a meeting held in Dominica Friday night.

Jamaica Exporters Poised to Decrease Caricom Deficit
In response to more than US$400 million in trade deficit that Jamaica has with it's Caricom partners, a group of Jamaican entrepreneurs went scouting the Caribbean Islands to explore export opportunities for local producers. The trade mission was spearheaded by the Jamaican Exporters Association (JEA) in conjunction with the state run business promotion agency - Jamaica Promotion Corporation (Jampro) and the Jamaica Manufacturers Association (JMA). Dr. Andre Gordon, President of JEA observed that Jamaica companies could earn up to US$500 million each year from exporting goods and services to Caricom markets.

Caribbean Trade News
News on Caribbean economic development, travel, Health and product export and import