Senior Investor Services Officer for the Department of Commerce and Investment (DCI), Shannon Francis, attended a two-day seminar in Kingston, Jamaica on ‘Attracting FDI through Good Investment Facilitation’.

Hosted by the Caribbean Export Development Agency, in collaboration with the Caribbean Association of Investment Promotion Agencies (CAIPA), the focus of the seminar was for investment promotions agencies (IPA) to gain a better understanding of investors and their expectations.

‘As Cayman’s IPA and a member of CAIPA, DCI saw benefits in learning the most current investment promotion techniques particularly in regard to investor support’, said Mr Ryan Rajkumarsingh, the DCI’s acting director. ‘There is a strong correlation between good investor facilitation and a confident business environment, stressing that investors place high importance on the level of facilitation services received when finalising their investment decision.’

Mrs Francis said the most difficult task for Caribbean IPAs, especially for those that are small, is assisting investors with timely, accurate, and ongoing information that is crucial to the investment decision process.

‘While all Caribbean islands are ultimately competing for projects, through CAIPA we work together to strengthen our capacity and image in an effort to attract investments to the region,’ she added.

CAIPA is a regional association, created in 2007 to assist IPAs with capacity-building. The association consists of 19 members, including all CARIFORUM countries and IPAs from British Overseas Territories.

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