NEW YORK – Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley says Caribbean and African countries have a duty to create their own trade routes, to be able to ensure they have the credit ratings that are credible, independent and fair, as opposed to ones that are going to rate countries with similar circumstances but different geographies.
“At the same time, we have to be able to believe in one another. Regrettably, we have been indoctrinated to look north before we look east or west, and that is fundamentally one of the first things to emancipate ourselves from that thought,” she said during a “fireside chat” yesterday with president and chairman of Afreximbank, Dr George Elombi, on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly.
Mottley said she wanted to give “full credit” to Afreximbank, which recognised it was important to create institutions that people can trust, “so that if you want to move the diaspora into Africa, it will be much easier if there is a bridge, and that bridge usually is a financial institution that they trust”.
60 branches
The Prime Minister said that in the case of the Caribbean, the Trinidadbased Republic Bank had almost 60 branches in Ghana and “it’s easier for a Caribbean person to move into Ghana because they know Republic Bank”.
“Similarly, those in Africa who now see that Afreximbank has a regional office in Barbados and is working in the Caribbean, from The Bahamas in the north to Belize in the west, to Guyana and Suriname in the south, to Barbados in the east, all of a sudden it becomes easier to think about how you’re going to make that path.”
Mottley said Africa and the Caribbean needed to start looking at what could be common trade and other investment agreements.
“Barbados has about 50, for example, agreements to avoid double taxation, but very few are in Africa. And why not? People use Barbados as a domicile to be able to help manage risk to go into Venezuela, to go into Brazil, to go into Cuba, to go to Mexico.
“Why are we doing it more in Africa? There’s just one or two countries with whom we have that relationship. And then the Africa Continental Free Trade Area and the CARICOM Single Market and Economy. We need to find a bridge that allows us to be able to get the benefit of both.”
Compromised
She said: “We now face a world in which three primary trade routes are effectively compromised: the Straits of Hormuz. In recent weeks, the Houthis have taken action in the Red Sea, and in the last month, Panama has announced that the number of vessels that will come through the canal will be reduced because of the reduction in levels of water, making it almost impossible for them to carry the same volume of vessels.
“If that does not teach us that we don’t need to go through any other route other than to cross the Atlantic, that the flight between Barbados and Dakar is six hours, that the flight between Barbados and Accra is seven hours, that the flight between Barbados and Lagos is seven and a half hours.
“The flight from Barbados to East Africa is probably about ten or 11 hours. We can get to the Gulf States in ten or 11 hours. What are we waiting on? I keep saying that, regrettably, there has to be a will, and I’m not sure that the will is as comprehensive across Africa and the Caribbean as we would like it,” Mottley told the audience. (CMC)
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