Barbados must look to emerging markets — Estwick

Saturday, November 21, 2009 7:31 AM

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Barbados must look to emerging markets - Estwick

Friday, November 06, 2009

Barbados' Minister of Economic Development Dr David Estwick says Barbados needs to look to emerging markets, especially those close to the island, for new international business opportunities.

Dr David Estwick

He was speaking in the House of Assembly during a debate on amendments to the Property Transfer Tax Act and the Stamp Duty Act to make Barbados more attractive to foreign investors.

These changes would make exempt from the payment of property transfer tax and stamp duty any transfer of shares to a person who is resident outside of Barbados, whether or not the transferor is resident here, where the assets of the company as well as its income is derived solely from sources outside of Barbados.

The minister said one of the areas which the island needed to do significantly better in was that of seeking to create an environment for international business development, and that would be in the context of examining the tax treaty agenda.

"One of the areas that has become very critical for us is to understand the international changes to the geopolitical dynamics of the world and also the economic landscape," he said. "The importance of that means that as we move to expand our double taxation treaty arrangements as well as to expand our bilateral information exchanges as well as other cooperation arrangements, that we now look very closely to the emerging markets.

"And we should look very closely . . . to those markets that are very close to Barbados and, in particular, those emerging markets within Latin America, and also look to other areas where there is economic strength and growth and development, so that we don't concentrate our efforts in areas of source support."

Estwick said despite Opposition strictures, there has not been any significant fall-off in foreign investor confidence or in the island's international competitive outlook.

He felt the amendments would not only redound to an improvement in the efficiencies in how international business was conducted but would also be a plus for investor confidence and how the sector's architecture was set up here.

"What it will also do is give international business persons now in Barbados an opportunity to operate on the same playing field as other international business sectors in the world," he said, "and as a result of that, that should redound ... for greater business opportunities for us in the area of international business."