Tunapuna, San Juan chambers urge: 'Vaccinate before it's too late'

Businesses have been at the frontlines of Trinidad and Tobago’s drive to vaccinate to operate, but for some businesses it may be too little, too late.

Chambers in San Juan and Tunapuna said the majority of businesses and their staff are participating in the drive to vaccinate.

But some businesses which have racked up huge amounts of debt and have suffered under the economic downturn may not be able to open their doors by the time the country is fully vaccinated and can reopen safely.

Greater Tunapuna Chamber of Industry and Commerce president Melissa Senhouse said the recent reopening of sectors had not had a major effect on businesses in the greater Tunapuna area, as most businesses there are retail, which still have not been allowed to reopen. She said from her own personal checks she did not see many businesses, even the ones that were allowed to reopen, up and running on Monday.

“I was sharpening my chops, but I didn’t get any doubles,” she said.

She said she is still getting feedback from those who reopened on Monday, but noticed that Chinese food places on the Eastern Main Road did not take advantage of the new regulations.

Senhouse brought up the concern that despite vaccinations, some businesses may not be able to reopen.

“The year 2019 was a relatively slow year, then 2020 came along and so did covid19. Whatever reserves you had is what you used in 2020.

"So we came into this lockdown already deterred."

She said most of the 120 businesses in her membership are small ones, and added that even if businesses weree able to reopen, they might do so with a reduced staff.

“Realistically, most businesses have been operating at a loss for the past three months,” she said. “We are still hoping that with the opening of businesses people in the area will get work, but a lot of business are worried that with the rest of the country locked down, there are still a lot of people unemployed. So they would be opening, but opening to whom?”

San Juan Business Association president Vivek Charran said food businesses allowed to reopen on Monday were happy to get back to work, albeit for pick-up and take-away services only. Manufacturers and car dealerships as well were also happy to be back after being allowed to reopen last week.

“Food vendors were out in their numbers, but the lines were controlled and spaced. Business was buoyant on Monday and patrons were happy to access their favorite food.

“Salespeople in the car sales businesses were also happy to come out. They remember how tough it was last year – some employees were working as little as nine days out of a month. Very few people were thinking about buying a brand-new car at the point in time, they were more worried about paying their rent.”

He said businesses in San Juan also have exhausted their savings and many, especially in malls, are contemplating ending their contracts with landlords until better times come.

Charran said he knew of businesses which, because of the amount of rent they owe their landlords had either to take loans or end their contracts to put a cap on the arrears.

“It is hard to,,,be forced to close because of a pandemic. When you are faced with foreclosure it is a hard thing to deal with, along with the fear of getting the virus.

“Some businesses are also concerned that if they end their contracts they are not sure to get the same locations back. Then there are is a lot of expenses involved with moving equipment and furniture out, storing it and putting it back when another contract is made.”

Charran said the only way for businesses to recover is to continue the drive to vaccinate as many people as possible.

His association has already reached out to the government to get vaccines. He said business owners have already been vaccinated and they are now having staf members do the same.

“The faster we could have citizens take the vaccine, the faster we could get to a better place where we could safely reopen. We have written to the government and they said they would give us 2,000 vaccines."

The first 500 would be shared at the Divali Nagar mass vaccination site, and he said another 500 people would be vaccinated on Sunday.

Senhouse said they were allocated 500 vaccines which would be distributed through the Supermarkets Association, but 590 of her members had applied to be vaccinated.

“So we had a really good response in that regard,” she said.

Last Tuesday TT received a shipment of 800,000 Sinopharm vaccines bought from China.