TOBAGO KNOCKING on your door

By Clint Chan Tack

WHILE Tobago could continue to derive its revenue from tourism, Tobago House of Assembly (THA) Chief Secretary Orville London is urging members of the Trinidad business community to dive into the island’s “sea of opportunities.” The Chief Secretary made this sales pitch for the sister isle when he addressed last week’s 2005 Trinidad and Tobago Chamber of Industry and Commerce annual general meeting and luncheon at the Hilton Trinidad. London said Tobago has been bequeathed with a legacy of tourism, noting that island has won global tourism awards  and is now in the midst of a tourism boom with 120,000 visitors expected to come to Tobago in 2005.

Efforts are also underway to increase the island’s existing stock of hotel rooms. However, London said Tobago is “not as desperate for tourist dollars” as other Caribbean islands, saying that his administration knows that given the uncertainties of global tourism, total reliance on this will not be enough to ensure its sustainable development. This, according to London, can best be achieved by tapping into the nation’s burgeoning energy wealth while simultaneously keeping the island’s tourism industry on a sound footing and developing new industries. He said the THA and Central Government have already made the first step towards the island’s economic diversification through the establishment of a new industrial estate at Cove in southern Tobago.

He said many of the industries there would be driven by natural gas and there were now opportunities for businessmen to use this clean-burning fuel to develop businesses such as plastics or pharmaceuticals in the sister isle. London added that since Tobago will feature prominently in the Eastern Caribbean Gas Pipeline project, it was only fair that the sister isle receive some of the project’s benefits. Crime and infrastructure are also being addressed by the THA, London said. Tobago has a very low crime rate, he said, noting that efforts are ongoing by law enforcement agencies and other bodies to deal with all aspects of crime in Tobago.

On the infrastructure front, the Chief Secretary indicated that the THA recently approved $28.5 million for the upgrade of roads in Tobago. On the issue of transport, London conceded that this has been a perennial problem for Tobago and business in the sister isle has been handicapped by it over the years. However, he was confident that the situation was now changing, given improvements to Tobago’s seabridge with the arrival of the MV Sonia and the fast ferry, The CAT. With increasing numbers of passengers and cargo being moved by sea, London said efforts are now being directed towards improving the airbridge where passenger loads have been poor within recent years and a far cry from the days of the now defunct TT Air Services (TTAS) airline which operated on the Tobago airbridge up to the late 1980’s. London said the air fare on the Tobago airbridge would have to been reviewed in order to ensure that passengers are provided with a reliable service.

Outside of the domestic airbridge, London said 11 foreign airlines have placed Tobago as one of their prime Caribbean destinations and more will be encouraged to come, once the $200 million Crown Point Airport expansion project is completed. He also said that the Scarborough jetty will receive a $12 million upgrade that will allow an increased number of cruise ships to visit Tobago. On Monday, a cruise ship was turned away from the Scarborough port to allow for the docking of the inter-island ferries. London also said Trinidad business people would be further encouraged to set up shop in Tobago given the island’s record low unemployment figures of 3.8 percent. He gave the assurance that as Tobago diversifies its economy and encourages more business development it will ensure that this does not harm the island’s pristine beauty. London added that the natural beauty of north-east Tobago and the commercial development of south-west Tobago shows that the island can strike the right balance between the economy and the environment.

It is also clear in his mind that the sister isle needs to diversify its growing tourism portfolio to one that includes manufacturing industries. In a recent  interview, Hochoy said economic diversification is vital to the sister isle’s development and will be a  priority for his administration. “We recognise that we have to diversify away from tourism, even if tourism is the major income earner for Tobago. It is a very volatile sector.” “Therefore, we have to find ways and means that we can diversify away from that without necessarily undermining or in any way, desecrating the environment. It is in that context that we are going to become very involved in the whole question of natural gas for development,” London said. Noting that parts of the Caribbean natural gas pipeline will make landfall in Tobago and gas will be piped from the sister isle to the rest of the Caribbean, the Chief Secretary was upbeat about it.
 
“Tobago is going to play a very integral role in that. Then, we are also going to be utilising natural gas for the development of what we call, clean development in Tobago,” he said. London said that the THA is now encouraging investments in enterprises such as agro-processing, organic agriculture and light manufacturing. However, he pointed out that with natural gas coming to Tobago, the opportunities will arise to encourage persons involved in “high energy kinds of industry” to set up shop.