Search Results for: Trinidad and Tobago

The International Cocoa Organisation (ICCO) has predicted that the chocolate industry will continue to face cocoa supply deficits, with its latest quarterly assessment predicting that for 2022/3, there will be 99,000 tonnes more grindings than cocoa production. As a result, global stocks will fall to 1.744 million tonnes, amidst declines in output from key production hubs Ghana and Côte d’Ivoire.…

The Turks & Caicos Islands (TCI) has been improving its AML record, even as its courts have taken eight years to hear financial crime cases against former political leaders, including past Premier Michael Misick. He is charged with money laundering, conspiracy to receive bribes, and conspiracy to defraud the government, related to his 2006-9 tenure.…

As competition in the global beverage market increases, manufacturers are looking to labelling as a key to grow brands through ‘premiumisation’, emphasising its superior quality, exclusivity and sustainability to consumers.

“Customers are looking for premiumisation of their beverage labelling in terms of embellishment, foiling, tactile finishes, but coupled with a sustainable twist,” said Ben Robinson, sales director at Bradford, UK-based The Label Makers, a company that produces labels for premium brands such as Trinidad & Tobago-manufactured Kraken Rum.…

Caribbean island states are looking to harness their natural advantage in bounteous sunlight to expand solar power, boosting their energy independence, while reducing the cost of energy as gas and oil prices rise. Even in oil and gas-rich Trinidad & Tobago, consumers have been feeling the energy pinch, facing increases in their electricity bills in 2023.…

The European Commission has added the British overseas territory (BOT) of Gibraltar to European Union (EU) list of high-risk countries with strategic deficiencies in their anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) regimes. This latest update to the EU AML blacklist (1) means that banks and other AML obliged entities will have to apply enhanced due diligence when dealing with transactions with Gibraltar, which was ceded to the UK in 1713, having been seized during the War of the Spanish Succession.…

Caribbean islands offering offshore financial services have been named on a European Union (EU) blacklist that claims to target jurisdictions who give companies unfair tax breaks when parking their money in local bank accounts. The EU Council of Ministers on October 4 added the Turks & Caicos Islands, a UK overseas territory (OT), to the list, while re-listing another UK OT, Anguilla, which had been removed as recently as last October (2021) and The Bahamas, which had been removed in 2018.…

RUSSIA’S invasion of Ukraine has prompted a major increase in sugar prices, the UN Food & Agriculture Organisation (FAO) has said. Its FAO Sugar Price Index averaged 117.9 points in March, up 7.4 points (6.7%) from February, and up 20% year-on-year.…

From bringing traditionally outsourced services in house to right-sizing staff, Caribbean financial professionals advising the region’s critically important tourism sector are making tough decisions to keep businesses afloat and redundancies to a minimum during Covid-19.

ACCA members speaking to A&B, however testified to solidarity among workers, clients and suppliers – and the resilience of a region used to disaster, albeit usually through extreme weather.…

Entrepreneurship abounds across the diverse island nations of the Caribbean where small, independently-owned beauty product businesses thrive and have been successfully vying for space alongside major international brands in pharmacies, boutiques and family-owned stores alike.

What many manufacturers lack in start-up capital, they make up for in innovation and close proximity to a wealth of organic, raw materials that are finding new favour with modern, discerning consumers at home, with an eye to developing export sales.…

ANTI-money laundering maybe a career that financial and legal professionals increasingly follow, but the training and qualification structure for AML/CFT is still emerging and solidifying, and there are doubts whether it will ever coalesce into a formal global structure, akin to FATF recommendations.…