By Newsday
Copyright newsday
THE EDITOR: I commend Prime Minister Kamla Persad-Bissessar on her bold yet controversial stance to have the names of top forex users revealed, notwithstanding my initial misgivings, which has brought clarity to many long suffering business owners.
Our manufacturing business has been in operation for about 22 years, and over the last 15 years my biggest customers have become major importers and hence my biggest competitors.
I am grateful to the Exim Bank which has supported and encouraged our export thrust by providing our small forex needs on a timely basis, without which we surely would not have survived. This is in stark contrast to my principal bankers (the largest) who are less willing in their support.
In fairness to them they never signed an oath of nobility to support my struggles as a manufacturer in toxic market conditions. So, I can’t blame them because they make a greater profit supporting commerce, trading, distribution and retail rather than manufacturing and export.
Manufacturers whose names appear on the list run the risk of having an unfair label and aspersions being thrown in their direction of being greedy – “double dipping” to access as much forex as possible. They may be accused of profiteering by accessing forex to expand their product range rather than an export thrust.
Questions may be asked if they utilise the forex to import products that are readily available locally and then these products find themselves in the Caricom export market under the guise of made in TT? This practice, some may say, can impact legitimate exporters of similar locally manufactured items.
The resulting extra scrutiny, if any culprits exists, may have a negative impact on already struggling manufacturers; especially SMEs which do not possess the manpower or finances to deal with this additional bureaucracy.
Many businesses are overjoyed that the Prime Minister kept her word to make the forex usage information public. This may now provide a much overdue level playing field for everyone and we look forward to equitable treatment from all forex traders.
ROBERT FORTUNE
