Farley not hopeful Tobago will be treated well

Elizabeth Gonzales

Tobago stakeholders are bracing for disappointment in the 2025 Budget, citing years of reduced allocations in comparison to their requests.

Chief Secretary Farley Augustine yesterday said the island should expect another dose of unfair treatment when the fiscal package is delivered on September 30.

“I am not hopeful that the budget measures will redound to the rebounding of the economy. Not hopeful that the measures he will present will provide for peace, safety and security for all. Not hopeful that the budget will cause citizens to hope for a brighter future. Not hopeful that Tobago will be treated well in the measures to be presented,” he said.

Other stakeholders are not eager about the upcoming presentation either, with some already predicting an empty budget for the island.

Tobago Hotel and Tourism Association president Alpha Lorde said he expects nothing big.

“New year same thing. The reality is historical lyrics. We have had budgets read and numbers put forward as to X for security, X for tourism and we have not had an accountability that says for the money put forward we would have achieved the things that we were going to do. My concern is we are going to go into a new fiscal year not necessarily being able to review clearly the things that were supposed to get done,” he said.

Lorde does not expect to receive the $3.$3.956 billion—5.8 per cent of the National budget— laid out in Augustine’s budget presentation last June.

Tobago’s budget request includes a recurrent expenditure of $2.81 billion, $1.002 billion for development programme expenditure, $91.9 million for the URP and $43.8 million for CEPEP.

Last fiscal year, the THA requested $4.54 billion from the Central Government to manage the island’s affairs. The island received $2.585 billion, with $2.298 billion allocated for recurrent expenditure, $216 million for development programme expenditure, and $18 million for the Unemployment Relief Programme.

“Nine out of ten times, the offer from Central Government is usually smaller than that which is budgeted. So the expectation of being able to achieve something is shrunk immediately and items have been reprioritised,” Lorde said

Still, he hopes to see measures that work to help the island generate forex to ease the existing shortage.

“Invest in tourism a whole lot more and Tourism can help alleviate the forex challenge. That is not a debatable question. The fact is the tourism sectors will bring hard dollars to the destination and those hard dollars will offset the forex challenges,” he said.

Tobago Chamber chairman Martin George made three wishes for the island. One is for immediate repeal of the Foreign Investment Act, which he said has stifled businesses on the island.

“This is legislation which has been on the books since 2008-2009 and it has hampered and stymied any and all foreign investments in Tobago. Every day you hear business persons complaining about the lack of foreign exchange, the difficulty to acquire foreign exchange, the inability to source their goods and to pay for things that are coming in from abroad, and yet, still, you have legislation on the books that is hampering and preventing and creating an obstacle to direct foreign investment in Tobago,” George said.

His second wish is for Tobago to be made a VAT and duty-free zone.

“Tobago can be the centrepiece for retirement in the Caribbean if you make it a VAT-free zone. People can come here to retire and they do not have that burden of VAT. It’s going to be attractive for even Trinidadians to come here and retire.”

His final wish is to see the arrival of Tobago’s cargo vessel, which was promised last year following a food crisis triggered by a fire on board the Cabo Star.