THE URGENT NEED FOR ACTION AFTER COVID-19

There is a developing national consensus that T&T will need a new VISION to negotiate the economic minefield that we will inhabit after the Covid-19 pandemic retreats into normalcy. I suggest that we will also urgently need some practical action plans, or the new VISION will become just another one of our hallucinations. Below, with a few edits, is my Facebook post from 2018 on the need for PRACTICAL ACTION. It was posted as I was developing the concept of IT’S UP TO ME — A Mantra for Cultural Transformation.

DIVERSIFICATION AND WE THE PEOPLE

The title of this piece is a direct take-off from Mary King’s very instructive article entitled DIVERSIFICATION AND THE POLITICIAN. The juxtaposition of the two titles exposes what I believe is the fundamental reason why for all our talk and changes of administrations, “no administration has been able to take us there yet” — an observation of political analyst Winford James in another article entitled PRUDENT MANAGEMENT, MR IMBERT?

Over the last few weeks, professional and social media have come alive with a chorus of criticisms of Finance Minister Imbert’s mid-term review of the economy. The consensus seems to be that the politician’s claim to having prudently managed the economy is false or ‘fake news’. According to Mary King “The economic storm may have lifted a bit as the wider global happenings in politics and financial investments continue out without our control”. Mrs King and others are trained, and experienced economists and I defer to their superior knowledge that “the economy has remained exactly the same”. At the same time, the entertaining unproductive war of words between the finance minister and the group of eminent professionals continues; barren because it’s a big blame game and no new practical working solutions are on offer.

But, did we really expect the Minister of Finance, a professional politician of many years, halfway into his party’s five-year term of office. His attention already focused towards the next election cycle in 2020, not to attempt to put the best spin possible on whatever little bit of good news he could extract from the figures? Get real people.

Could the fundamental problem be that WE the People have continued to outsource our joint responsibility for finding economic solutions, to the politicians, of all administrations that we have s-elected in the past 50 years? Mary King continues “This model of our economy, the plantation is all that we have known throughout our history… Yet some fifty years later, the refrain continues with little progress to show – an abject failure in the governance of the country, the private sector and the knowledge-based institutions to create a sustainable economy”. It is noteworthy that she at least apportions some blame to the private sector and the knowledge-based institutions, which I take to be our institutions of higher education.

So let’s examine roles by asking a few questions.

·        Is it fair or reasonable to expect politicians who operate with limited job security, five years maximum — and technocrats without actual business experience — the two dominant groups that comprise the government (ADMINISTRATION) sector, to make the major and minor decisions about innovation, new industries, disruptive technologies and businesses that will replace the ageing energy and plantation models that we inherited? 

Except for the few who may have come from the business sector, they are likely to possess neither the training, the aptitude, the experience, nor the job security to qualify for this major task. Yet we the people continue to outsource this responsibility to governments (ADMINISTRATIONS)

. Mary King said it — “an abject failure in the governance of the country”.

·        But we give the business community a ‘bligh’, without even a little rap on the knuckles. Which leads us back to this fundamental question. Can anyone tell us with authority, how many proposals, for original projects for new export earning innovative businesses have been put on the table by the private sector for consideration, in the last 50 years?

I remember one. Pt Lisas was the vision of a south business group led by Mr. Montano. Never mind that governments got most of the credit.

Yet this is the group best suited to make decisions and undertake risky business undertakings. They have capital, access to capital, the training, the aptitude, the management skills and the experience to assess business ventures. 

Alas, they too seem to be waiting for governments (ADMINISTRATIONS) to come up with the creative strategies and plans and finance for the projects for them to execute.

·        Has the financial system, flush with bounty from previous boom years made any overtures or set up any new financial systems to facilitate start-up enterprises or even the retooling of existing businesses. Not according to Donna Hadad businesswoman and a former banker at a recent joint meeting of regional chambers of commerce. She spoke from the recent Tobago Seabridge experience.

But we have seen the investments in malls, the luxury vehicle imports, the foreign foods, alcohol and brands on the shelves and are witnessing now the jostling for scarce foreign exchange to keep their establishments open. 

This is not an attempt to vilify the private sector as risk-averse. Businesses put their money on the line every time they place an import order or build a mall. All business is risk. But on the other hand, it is possible that the bigger risk that business may be taking is not investing in changing economic conditions.

·        Our universities are now struggling for funds to survive. But in the days of plenty, did they make strong recommendations to governments and private enterprise for funding to undertake the training programmes and research projects in areas of expertise that could help to transform the energy-dependent and plantation economies?

What I remember is a constant stream of criticism of whatever projects were proposed or started by the various governments (ADMINISTRATIONS). One personal memory is of a prominent economics professor at the time describing the Pt Lisas development in strictly negative terms.

·       Universities are institutions where the responsibility of the learned and experienced teaching staff should not only be to produce students with academic qualifications for the job market but should also serve the nation as active centres of creative thinking and experimentation. Why, for instance, do our institutions of higher education have to wait for a government to set up an Economic Advisory Board to make recommendations for diversification? Shouldn’t there be Economic Advisory Groups/Clubs/ Societies/Think Tanks across all faculties that challenge our bright young minds to find solutions to our problems?

Some of those solutions may provide the job and career opportunities and the enterprises that would guarantee their future.

·        Why is ETeck Park taking so many years to get going?

·        And how have WETHE PEOPLE responded to this national crisis?

Raise your hand if you have postponed an overseas vacation, made it your business to buy local rather than foreign wherever possible, drank local rum and beer instead of foreign whiskey and champagne, or not used your influence to get scarce foreign exchange to purchase that new high-end SUV, or given some thought to starting a new business that can earn foreign exchange.

·        Is it time now for We the People to get involved in the business of INNOVATION and DIVERSIFICATION for our economic transformation?

·        Who are the innovators we need to encourage and resource?

They are:

? The current owners of businesses, especially those facing the necessity to rethink their business models.

? The new entrepreneurs who will need start-up support and mentoring.

? The bright young students, graduates and teachers of our institutions of higher education: Mary King’s “knowledge-based institutions”?

? The young scientists who will develop new and disruptive technologies.

? The farmers and food processors who will come up with ways and means to increase local input in to manufacturing; scale up agricultural products like cocoa and coconuts, Moruga Hill Rice and the lowly peppers; all products with existing expanding international markets.

? The young and not so young computer nerds who will create the next internet app or game with the potential to earn millions, even billions.

? Any citizen with a workable bankable innovative idea.

 WHO WILL BELL THE CAT?

‘Who will bell the cat’ is the title of an old children’s story about the necessity to take practical actions to solve problems. So, who will undertake the job of creating the environment in which an innovative business culture will thrive in Trinidad and Tobago? “The central conservative truth is that it is culture, not politics, that determines the success of a society”. David Patrick Moynihan

Is the creation of a national culture the priority assignment that has eluded us all these years? All it takes is for any one unit to take the initiative and hit the start button for the serious conversations to begin. We could do worse than start with a national conversation by business organisations, farmers, students and entrepreneurs on Vision 2030. It’s out there hiding in plain sight on the WorldWideWeb.

Perhaps this is the job best suited to the professional politicians and our ‘validating elites’. To put the whole country in crisis mode, to suspend for a while the useless “kicksin” in parliament, to stage the diversification conversations and mobilise all citizens to think and act innovation. Dr Terrence Farrell has said that “economics trumps politics”. Well, we could still ‘play for game’ even if the cards we have been dealt are all low and bush. But we have to play as a team.

We need first to stop outsourcing the responsibility for our future to governments (ADMINISTRATIONS). We will approach the problems from different directions with different skills and resources. We will propose different solutions. But we must agree to disagree without being disagreeable. In the end, we will find spaces where we can agree to work together and, or just quietly do our little bit

Here is one suggestion, my 2cts worth. Establish a VOLUNTARY National Consultation on the Economic Future of T&T (NCEFTT) with a mandate to produce a multifaceted strategy for economic transformation in say 12 months. The membership must comprise VOLUNTEERS from the business communities, higher education, economic interest groups such as farmers, political groupings and interested individuals. The consultation must be free to determine its methods, and its personnel. The NCEFTT will report to the nation and also to parliament, not the government (ADMINISTRATION) temporarily office. sS far as practical deliberations should take place in public, with the people having opportunities to contribute. Modern technology facilitates such a broad-based operation.

But do we have the political maturity to consider such an idea?

Our Griot Black Stalin suggested, “WE COULD MAKE IT IF WE TRY, JUST A LITTLE HARDER”.  IT’S UP TO ME and YOU (We the People) to be the change we want to happen.

By the way, did anybody see my diversification green donkey?

Ends

2020 UPDATE

Here is a 2020 living example of CITIZENS’ ACTION. Check out Omardath Maharaj’s and Raul Bermudez’s

practical action on food security. #breadfruitfarmers.com   #breadfruittrees.com