Work on the Secure Transactions in movable properties legislation is now into its second phase with the development of the legislative framework and appropriate regulations.    Access to finance had been a long standing issue for the private sector particularly small and medium enterprises. Research indicates that approximately 70% of a firm’s wealth is concentrated in its movable assets.  

A survey of St. Lucian business revealed that access to finance ranks number one in the top ten business environment constrains, with the cost of electricity and transportation running a distant second and third respectively. It is for this reason coupled with the thrust to improve the ease of doing business climate in St. Lucia that the National Competitiveness and Productivity Council (NCPC) embarked on the introduction of legislative reform aimed at facilitating the use of movable assets as collateral.   Economist with the NCPC, Sharma Mathurin Explains. 

“Businesses as well as individuals will be able to utilize their valuable assets such as accounts receivables, industrial equipment, inventory, etc., as collateral in order to apply for loan financing within banks and other financial institutions.”

Mathurin noted that lending institutions on island concentrate almost exclusively on real or immovable property, such as house and land, as there is an establish legal and registry framework which support the rights in real property.  This requirement however inhibits the growth and productivity of many small business operators who do not possess the requirements for traditional loan financing. 

“This is very detrimental to your wider economy because it basically prevents private sector expansion because it basically prevents new businesses from being able to be formed and be able to employ persons.  It inhibits existing business from being able to expand their operations.  It inhibits businesses from being able to access export financing in order to market their goods and services to other regional and international markets.” 

Executive Director of the St. Lucia Manufacturers Association, Paula James, welcomes the introduction of the Secure Transactions in Movable Properties Legislation while indicating that the customer, the lender and other parties must be well protected to be able to use the legislation as a part of regular business transactions. 

“The reason why a lot of persons have difficulty with accessing finance is because they have no tangible security.  So as a business person you may have two vans, a car but the bank would not take a bill of sale over that as security to lend you some money if they are not sure and they cannot verify whether this movable property is not mortgaged or assigned to a financial institution and these things are easy to transfer. You can move them from point A to point B with a blink of an eye. This legislation it will also help us because it will also cover if we have assets in another territory, we can look at using that asset to secure financing in St. Lucia.” 

It is expected that the Secure Transactions in Movable Properties Legislation should be approved before the end of this financial year and it will be accompanied by the establishment of an online Collateral Registry of movable assets which will be housed within the High Court. Charon Gardner Hippolyte Former Registrar of the High Court clarified how the registry will work. 

“It would be something that is online. You don’t physically have to come in.  You would be able to go and search and be able to identify if a person has any loan on a particular vehicle if you want to enter into a transaction. Now, in terms of privacy obviously it is not opened to everybody to be able to do that so you want to make sure that it’s secure. There are aspects of privacy because quite frankly I don’t think you or I would want average Joe Public to just go onto the online registry, type in our name and ascertain exactly what we own and where we own it.”  

The NCPC plans to ramp up its sensitization efforts with key stakeholders and the general public regarding the Secure Transactions in Movable Properties Legislation as the implementation date draws closer. 

Government is seeking to simplify the administrative processes and procedures in reference to goods entering and leaving the country.  In 2009 Cabinet gave permission for the establishment of a Port Community Single Window to increase St. Lucia’s competitiveness in regards to the trading of goods.  

In a thrust to improve St. Lucia’s ‘Ease of Doing Business’ ranking the government of St. Lucia has focused on trade facilitation of domestic and commercial goods in and out of the island’s ports. Government is seeking to implement what is termed a Port Community Single Window to electronically harmonize and standardize information relating to the clearing of goods. 

Trade Facilitation Officer, Suzette Lewis-Jean explained how this system will significantly improve the ease of doing business in St. Lucia. 

“What it’s going to do, it’s going to make trading easier.  And if we would like to be competitive on the global market we really have to make trading within our borders a lot easier for investors.  So for example you have customs with the ASYCUDA system, SLASPA has its own and here are a lot of others, you have the truckers, the shippers.  What we are hoping to do get all the agencies together under a single umbrella or a single window as we will call it. So when a trader uploads his manifest he does it once. So there would be no reason to go to Customs and back to SLASPA, then go to Agriculture all these different agencies you only upload these things once and it goes through the system until a decision has been made on your input.”

She stated that the World Trade Organization (WTO) Trade Facilitation agreement makes it mandatory for all its members to establish a single window.  Developing countries like St. Lucia stand to benefit from this trade facilitation agreement of which the single window is a major component. 

“So, we must do it so that we can become attractive to investors and make it easier for all of us in fact who are trading within our borders.”

Sabin Bajazet is the Communication and External Affairs manager for Seba in Guadeloupe. Seba is a private company charged with managing the Port Community Single Window in Guadeloupe for the past 15 years. She said the port single window facilitates all the logistics and trade facilitation processes in a completely paperless system. 

“First of all it’s not an IT programme, it’s not an IT project. IT is part of it. It’s really how we do business, how we are declaring our goods. How we’re doing importation, exportation, transshipment, so the way of doing the process will actually be optimized through the system.”

She noted that the value added St. Lucia will receive from implementing such as system far out weights the initial setup cost. 

However the modality for the operationalization and running of the Port Community Single Window is yet to be decided upon by government. 

“We have to put together a steering committee and then we are going to do an analysis and gather all the information that we need. Then a determination will be made as to whether it’s housed with government, whether a separate company is developed or setup to run it or whether we allow the private sector to run with it. So it’s a decision that will be made once we have all the information that is necessary.”

Jamaica and Guadeloupe have already established the Port Single Window within their territories.  The implementation of the Port Community Single Window is considered a priority on the Ease of Doing Business agenda for Saint Lucia.

The Government of St. Lucia via the National Competitiveness and Productivity Council is seeking to encourage increased levels of competitiveness within St. Lucia via the development of a Competitiveness Agenda.  From March 4^thto 8^th the consultant hired to develop the Competitiveness Agenda solicited input from key stakeholders on the various pillars of competitiveness which drive economic growth.  

The National Competitiveness and Productivity Council (NCPC) via funding from Compete Caribbean commenced work on the National Competitiveness agenda for St. Lucia. The National Competitiveness Agenda once completed will provide the NCPC with the framework to measure how well St. Lucia is performing as it relates to various actions, policies and initiatives undertaken to improve the island’s competitiveness. Fiona Hinkson is the Director of the NCPC. 

“When you speak of competitiveness it’s important to benchmark yourself. So the World Economic Forum has established twelve pillars of competitiveness by which countries are to measure themselves in terms of how well they are doing in relation to competitiveness.”

Hinkson noted that the twelve pillars of competitiveness are broken down into four main categories first of which is the creation of the enabling environment.  

“The second category the human capital where you look at the skill of the population as well as the health of the population, markets in terms of trade, how well you’re doing in that area and the innovation ecosystem, looking at the ease of doing business environment as well as the innovation capability.”

Product Development Consultant with Compete Caribbean, Dr. Kieron Swift is part of a two man team interfacing with various stakeholders on island soliciting their input for the development of the St. Lucia’s Competitiveness Agenda.

“The Competitiveness agenda for St. Lucia is really expected to help bring together a lot of the work, a lot of the studies and analysis that have gone before in terms of identifying St. Lucia’s particular economic strength, particular vision and direction it wants to go and really bring those together to help the coordination of the action the implementation of the recommendations that would have been brought forward.”

He noted that Compete Caribbean operates on the perspective that in order to have a strong and resilient Caribbean, you need a strong and resilient private sector.   Carlos Diez is the Director of Entrepreneurial Competitiveness with Infyde, the consultants hired by Compete Caribbean to develop the Competitiveness Agenda for St. Lucia. Infyde is a private international consultancy firm based in Spain specializing in economic development policies and innovation strategies for national and regional government around the world. 

“In this week we will have a lot of interviews and round tables with representatives of the pillars the competitiveness of the country and the focus of these meetings is to gather information about the competitiveness and productivity situation of the country.”

The NCPC Director noted that the formulation of the competitiveness agenda for St. Lucia will involve multiple consultations  with the  private sector, civil society organizations, the youth among others important stakeholders.