Better business sector, but ‘job not over’

Senator Darcy Boyce (FP)

Thu, February 09, 2012 - 12:00 AM

Barbados’ international business sector is starting to turn around, and Government will be paying even more attention to getting other countries to invest their businesses here, Government Senator Darcy Boyce said yesterday.

Boyce made the comments whilst members were debating the Exempt Insurance (Amendment) Bill 2012, which would remove certain monetary restrictions but still allow outside jurisdictions to do business here, and hire more Barbadians.

“The sector, in terms of new registration, has done fairly well. About 100 new companies have registered, taking that number into the mid 500s, and renewals have also increased by about 150,” Boyce told the Upper Chamber.

But he knows the job is far from complete.

“We still have to do a lot more work in the international business sector. We can’t stand still [and] think that because we’ve improved, that we’ve done all there is to be done.

The competition keeps doing more, and we have to keep up, even with the limited resources we have,” noted Boyce.

Still not settled

According to Boyce, work in the sector had stymied due to current economic conditions.

“The international [situation] has still not settled sufficiently to enable those companies to earn the sort of revenues they were earning before. The interest rates and yields on bonds worldwide have been very low, and the stock markets have not done well until recently.

So the companies have not been able to make huge profits,” Boyce reminded members.

He noted some companies had pulled up shop and decided to leave, but many remain and continue to hire Barbadians, as well as make a profit, even it if was smaller than in previous years.

Boyce added that Government continued to change the language and format of certain double taxation treaties so as to attract more business to the island. He cited a recent example where one such change allowed the country, in collaboration with Invest Barbados, to attract business from Central America, namely Mexico. (BA)