(Caribbean Development Bank Press Release) October 17, 2019, MIAMI, Florida – Leaders and experts are calling for more collaboration across the Caribbean to unlock the potential of the, noting that a regional approach can help overcome the inherent challenges of size and scale.
The calls came at Blue Economy Caribbean 2019, held in Miami, Florida on 15 October, where speakers highlighted collaboration as a way to enhance investment, development, research and governance of the blue economy. The event was sponsored by the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB), in partnership with the Government of Canada.
Vice-President, Operations of the Caribbean Development Bank, Monica La Bennett led the call in the opening reflections session of the event.
“The benefits of a One-Caribbean approach to the Blue Economy are twofold. By reducing intra-regional competition, countries can engage multinationals on stronger footing, thereby decreasing the discounts offered to attract these companies into one country versus the other. And, by unifying the Region and improving our economies of scale, financing and equity investment projects are made more accessible because of the combined size of regional/multi-country interventions, as opposed to single small-scale ones,” stated La Bennett.
This point came into focus during the session on financing the blue economy, where a mix of commercial and development bankers from CDB, the Inter-American Development Bank, Royal Bank of Canada and JPMorgan Chase Corporate and Investment Bank shared recommendations for creating the right ecosystem for financing the sector.
Speaking on the short to medium term prospects for the sector, Vice President at JPMorgan Chase Corporate and Investment Bank, Public Sector Group, Poorvi Kunzru, urged Caribbean industry leaders to “really put the size-scale proposal to work” by coming together to…
