Manning wants to change TT job culture

PRIME MINISTER Patrick Manning wants the people of Trinidad and Tobago to get away from the culture of always having to look for a job. Without spelling it out, the Prime Minister feels nationals should create work and employment for themselves. In a speech prepared in his name, but read by then acting Prime Minister Joan Yuille-Williams on Saturday night, the Prime Minister explained that those who are so minded should turn to the National Entrepreneurship Development Company (NEDCO) which, he observed, offers a full range of support services to make this possible. The Prime Minister’s address was read at NEDCO’s Apex 2004 awards ceremony, held at the Crowne Plaza Hotel. Fifteen persons graduated through NEDCO, an initiative of the Ministry of Labour and Small and Micro-Enterprises Development.

According to the Prime Minister, “It is important that we seek to promote an entrepreneurial culture among a far greater number of the young people in our population.” Looking further ahead, the Prime Minister observed that in a world where less people are required to do more work, and even to hold more jobs, “we as a nation have to address the need for small business development, otherwise going forward could also mean slipping backwards at another level.” As far as the Prime Minister is concerned, Government has been putting several initiatives in place to address the challenge. He advised that the stimulation of small and micro-entrepreneurship involved much more than providing a support base for many businesses that would not see the light of day.

He warned, however, that private sector financial institutions do not normally support ideas and initiatives in the small business sector until these have blossomed into investments with which they can associate very little risk. The Prime Minister made it clear that there was hardly an area of development more pertinent to personal, community and national development than the micro-enterprise sector. According to Manning, NEDCO currently has a clientele of some 3,000 entrepreneurs.