Participation in global market can alleviate poverty – Ambrose-Black

Participation in global markets/exports is sufficient for Least Developed Countries (LDCs) to begin to climb the development ladder and address poverty among their citizens while the lifeblood of the global market is trade.{{more}}

These points were made by executive director at Invest SVG Bernadette Ambrose-Black while she spoke at an Invest SVG workshop on July 21.

The workshop, dubbed “Surviving the trade jungle: Export and Import Procedures Made Easy,” was held at Invest SVG’s conference room, which is located in the Bank of St Vincent and the Grenadines (BOSVG) building on Granby Street.

Ambrose-Black stressed that trade policies, “the ease of doing business as it relates to exporting and importing, in today’s ‘flat world’ are issues of utmost concern to developing countries because these policies and activities will dictate the terms on which Least Developed Countries (LDCs), such as ours, will be integrated into the global economy.”

She said that the development debate is often framed as “trade versus aid,” suggesting that participation in global markets is sufficient for LDCs to begin to develop.

Speaking to the gathering of business people at the workshop, the Invest SVG Director said that in reality, trade is just one more tool for development, while it is closely related to import and export procedures.

“Theoretically, aid, combined with in-country economic and governance reforms, should create the conditions for LDCs such as St Vincent and the Grenadines, to take advantage of globalization for growth. However, LDCs’ preparations for global competition are only one part of the equation; international trade policy is what they inevitably encounter when they enter the market”, said Ambrose-Black.

Invest SVG provides services related to business facilitation (both pre-establishment and post-establishment) and Ambrose-Black explained that with that comes trade promotions and to an extent trade facilitation.

“Trade facilitation is an important consideration for governments of developing countries,” stressed Ambrose-Black, who added that during the course of the execution of duties at Invest SVG, they have come to the realization that businesses suffer from both direct border related costs (those that can be expenses related to the supply of information and documents to the relevant authority) and indirect costs (such as those arising from procedural delays, lost business opportunities and the lack of predictability in regulations).

“We at Invest SVG believe that everyone stands to gain from making the process of trade simpler.”

The executive director observed that it is particularly important to note that trade facilitation also brings more efficient and reliable tax collections.

“Improved border procedures will ultimately have a knock-off effect on other areas of the economy. In fact, statistics have proven that countries that are competitive in trade terms find it easier to attract foreign direct investment, for example. Exporting and importing helps grow national economies and expands the global market. Every country is endowed with certain advantages in resources and skills. Imports are important for businesses and individual consumers.”

She added that while countries and individuals often need to import goods that are either not readily available domestically or are available cheaper overseas, individual consumers also benefit from the locally produced products with imported components, as well as other products that are imported into the country.

She added that while countries want to be net exporters rather than net importers, importing is not necessarily a bad thing, because it gives us access to important resources and products not otherwise available or at a cheaper cost and this improves standards of living.

“However, just like eating too much candy, it can have bad consequences. If you import more than you export, more money is leaving the country than is coming in through export sales. This is something that we are trying to reverse with workshops such as these, whereby one can gain valuable information toward navigating the process of the procedures involved in not only entering new markets, but in also importing goods.”

She added, however, that the more a country exports, the more domestic economic activity is occurring.

“More exports mean more production, jobs and revenue. If a country is a net exporter, its gross domestic product increases, which is the total value of the finished goods and services it produces in a given period of time. In other words, net exports increase the wealth of a country.”

The workshop was facilitated in part by the Caribbean Export Development Agency (CEDA), through a grant by the European Union (EU).

The workshop was the first step in a two-pronged approach to giving back to the investing and exporting communities.

The second step entails filming a series of videos with the entities represented at the workshop, with the aim of filling the information gap about how to proceed when dealing with these departments and the process of doing business.