The President of the Bahamas Chamber of Commerce envisions the impending trade mission to Panama and other initiatives on the drawing board as prime opportunities for The Bahamas to begin arresting its substantial trade deficit.
The latest figures released from the Department of Statistics weeks ago showed that the deficit for 2005 was $2.11 billion, the highest over a consecutive five-year period. The 2002 deficit in merchandise trade, $1.4 billion, was the lowest deficit recorded for the period of 2001 to 2005, while the 2003 deficit of $1.5 billion was the second lowest for the same period.
Last year the value of imports totaled $2.5 billion, which was a 30% increase over the 2004 total of $1.9 billion.
“The efforts of the [Bahamas Chamber of Commerce] are geared towards ensuring that we have to balance [the trade deficit] a little bit more and it’s all about opportunities,” said Tanya Wright.
“The more opportunities that Bahamians have to help to grow this private sector to be able to produce more than just services but goods that are value first of all to our local market and the tourist market and the international market, I think we will see that the gap between our imports and exports would be drawn closer together.”
She referred to the potential for several trade missions including the latest planned for Latin America to do just that and preferably sooner than later. Proponents of the move reason that establishing the mutual linkages with the growing economies could eventually lead to a burgeoning export market for The Bahamas. However they acknowledge that Bahamians must exhibit a certain degree of aggression to make it happen.
“We certainly hope that it’s [in the] short term and initiatives such as what we are doing here with Panama and opportunities that we are hoping to create with China, India and the rest of the world is a step in taking us there a little faster than our other agenda would have taken us.”
According to last year’s figures, The Bahamas exported only $293 million worth of goods primarily comprised of chemicals like polystyrene and other plastic materials and food and live animals, inclusive of crawfish, salt and rum.
Most of the exports went to the U.S with the exception of crawfish where a significant amount was shipped to France.
Nerissa Gibson, assistant director of the Department of Statistics explained at the time the factors that have impacted the extent to which this country send products abroad. She also acknowledged the devastation that factors like the citrus canker on Abaco’s crops and severe weather systems have had on the level of exports.
“Unless we find some more things to grow or more industries coming in, that’s what [the deficit] will look like,” Ms. Gibson warned.
With tourism being the primary industry off which this economy thrives, The Bahamas is considered a major exporter of services.
The country has also done a significant amount of trade with countries in the European Union [United Kingdom, France and Germany], Curacao, Puerto Rico, and Japan.
The Minister of Foreign Affairs Fred Mitchell said this week that in the case of Chinese-Bahamas relations there has been an exponential explosion of trade since diplomatic relations were agreed. One estimate is that the value of that trade has been US $150 million.
He said the on-going concern of the Government, in the continuous process of the economic development of The Bahamas, is to foster an increase in both trade and investment, to continue to provide the highest possible standard of living for all Bahamians, at the lowest possible cost.
“Trade is the natural precursor of investment; it builds a platform of trust, confidence and familiarity upon which investment can take place,” he told a China Shop and Ship conference this week.
The Chamber of Commerce head suggested that for all of the efforts that officials are taking in that regard it is still up to individuals in the private sector to seize the opportunities that are being created.
By: Tameka Lundy, The Bahama Journal
