THA looks to cut foreign investment red tape

THERE is a need for Tobago to attract foreign direct investment, according to Finance Secretary Joel Jack. The secretary said the Division of Finance and the Economy is developing a medium-term strategy that will attract investment to the island.

Jack was speaking at Wednesday’s post Executive Council media briefing at Victor E Bruce Financial Complex in Scarborough.

Jack said: “I have been working with the Minister of Finance to see how best we can treat with all the administrative bottlenecks, the bottlenecks in the processing of the land licence regime.

A number of the investors, they don’t have a challenge with the land licence regime, the problem is the protracted timelines in getting the approvals and we have started to treat with all the administrative hurdles and all the issues to see how best we can get the timelines down from upwards of 90 days to as short as less than 30 days, and that is the feedback that we’re getting from persons, so we’re working on that.”

He said Tobago needs to eliminate the red tape that hinders foreign direct investment.

“We’re therefore required to refine all the existing institutional structures and provide a greater enabling environment for doing business here in Tobago.

“We need to signal to the world that Tobago is open for business and we must ensure that potential investors and current investors that they have the necessary assurance that when they are coming to Tobago and to Trinidad and Tobago to invest, that we have a smooth pipeline to facilitate the process.”

Jack said foreign direct investment would benefit Tobago tremendously including: inward flow of capital into the economy; improved access to technology and innovative practices; additional employment opportunities; infrastructural development throughout the island.

In May, chairman of the Tobago Business Chamber Martin George called for the Foreign Investment Act to be repealed as he felt it was not helping the island. The Foreign Investment Act provides regulations guiding foreign investors' interests in TT.

George said if the Act is repealed it would “allow once more to have direct foreign investment flow into Tobago.”

Contacted following the news conference, George reiterated his call.

He said, “We therefore are in no way supportive of any attempts to have discussions to speed up bottlenecks, to resolve issues with the legislation that have been going on for more than ten years without any success. It needs to go. The entire Act needs to be repealed totally and completely, we are not at all in support of any attempts to delay and further create confusion and doubt by talking about trying to ease up the bottlenecks and to try to speed up the process for granting land licences.

"Look at the history of it… In ten years you’ve had less than ten licences issued totally, clearly it's not working. Let’s admit the failure and get rid of the land licence regime and repeal the Foreign Investment Act completely.”