PORT OF SPAIN, Trinidad, CMC – Trinidad and Tobago Wednesday confirmed that efforts are well advanced for a regional ferry service that would link the country with Guyana and Barbados.
Last week, Guyana’s President. Irfaan Ali said the three countries had “formed a joint company that would work to introduce a ferry system for passenger and cargo between Trinidad and Tobago, Guyana and Barbados.”
Ali, who was speaking at the signing ceremony for a new US$35 million Mackenzie/ Wismar Bridge, did not elaborate. Still, Prime Minister Dr. Keith Rowley, addressing the launch of the Phoenix Park Industrial Estate (PPIE) at Point Lisas in Central Trinidad, said, “Only recently you would have heard of the closing of discussions and readiness to establish a regional cargo ferry service between Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago and Barbados.
“This decision is driven by the need to move raw materials and fresh produce from the producing areas to the consumption and manufacturing areas within this sub-zone of CARICOM.”
Rowley told the audience that the “outcome of such a transportation service can improve our food security, stimulate production across the region, create jobs, and support affordable prices of the many agricultural products we desire at our tables and in our hotels.”
Regional countries have identified sea and air transportation as significant constraints facing the regional integration movement; CARICOM has set itself a target of reducing its multi-billion US dollar food import bill by 25 percent by 2025.
In 2022, CARICOM approached the United Arab Emirates (UAE) for funding to establish this intra-regional ferry service, with the Barbados-based Caribbean Development Bank (CDB) being tasked with ironing out a proposed roadmap study for a fast ferry service with an initial focus on trade between Guyana, Trinidad and Tobago, Grenada, and Barbados.
He said that to build confidence and develop new markets and opportunities for locally manufactured goods, the Ministry of Trade and Industry will soon finalize a Partial Scope Trade Agreement with Chile.
“This will afford an expanded product market with the “made in Trinidad and Tobago” label. When this eventually happens, it will close the chapter of building such a trading relationship as we set about during my state visit to Chile at the invitation of President Michele Bachelet a few years ago”.
He said Port of Spain, in a bid to extend and strengthen its commercial reach, has already established commercial offices in Panama, the United Kingdom, and the United States and appointed Commercial Attachés in Guyana and Jamaica.
“This will assist exporters in overcoming trade barriers, entering new markets, and forging new business relationships in their respective markets,” he said.
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