Seize spot in special economic zones, Hill urges investors
Published:Monday | June 20, 2022 | 12:10 AMEdmond Campbell/Senior Staff Reporter
Minister of Industry, Investment and Commerce, Senator Aubyn Hill, says there is a huge window of opportunity for Jamaica as the Government engages investors to take up the 650 acres of Caymanas property and four areas in Trelawny earmarked for special economic zones (SEZ).
Coming out of the Summit of the Americas, and at a meeting before that with United States officials, Hill told The Gleaner that the Biden administration has made it clear that the Caribbean and Latin America are now their focus for investment.
He argued that one of the favourable outcomes of the pandemic was that people do not want overly complex supply chains.
“The Americans, Canadians, and others in the hemisphere don’t want their medicine from Japan and China when there is distress. Jamaica is 75 minutes away from the United States, so we now need to say, ‘long supply chains cut out, nearshoring is big,’” he said.
Hill said that it was disclosed that the $60-billion capital pool of the United States Development Finance Corporation, formerly the Overseas Private Investment Corporation, and the $130 billion in the US EXIM Bank could be tapped to invest in the region.
The increased training of young people has become even more urgent for the Government, with the prospects of investors building out the massive Caymanas SEZ, which would create significant job opportunities.
The industry, investment and commerce minister said that the Government has repurposed the HEART Trust/NSTA, under the leadership of Professor Alvin Wint, to ensure that young people receive skills through training.
Hill said that the Government is taking steps to provide seed funding for the Caymanas SEZ, which will remove the up-front risk from which private investors usually shy away.
The Cabinet minister said that the administration had made the decision to pump between $40 million and $60 million into the project to build out the roads up to the gate of the development.
“We are going to put in water, which is largely there already. We are going to put in broadband infrastructure right up to the gate, so that the infrastructure that developers need will be there, and when you get that seed funding and take out some of that risk, then you see developers coming in,” Hill said
Commenting on plans to establish four SEZs in Trelawny, Hill said that the first step is to set up what he called Jamaica West 77 Park.
“What we are going to do is to give developers an area. One developer can say, ‘I want to do high-tech development.’ They can then develop that in a similar way to how Caymanas is to be developed, put in who they want in it, because they will have a long lease,” Hill explained.
The second SEZ is dubbed Xanadu, which will be a creative park where people who want to do movies and plays, among other things, can use the facility. He indicated that a developer can come in and rent the space and make it available to others at a cost.
He said that investors will also be given the opportunity to further develop the Trelawny Multipurpose Stadium.
“We have the Olympus – it is going to be around the Trelawny cricket field – it has never been used as it should be, so we are going to have the NBA people always want to come down there, both from the NBA and colleges and high schools,” Hill told The Gleaner.
He continued: “We don’t have the service areas to give them, so we are saying to a developer, ‘Here it is, put in your track, put in the football field, put in the cricket field and upgrade it, and you have Olympus.’”
Last Friday, Hill and the leadership of the Port Authority of Jamaica (PAJ) hosted investors from around the world who came to see sections of the 650-acre Caymanas property that the Government is moving to offer long-term leases for SEZ purposes.
He told prospective investors that the Government will be providing 50 years of tax-free benefits in a long-term lease arrangement.
The prospective investors toured the five free zones owned by the Port Authority of Jamaica.
“Right at this meeting on these buses, we have some people who are talking to us from faraway nations; some from Africa, some from Europe, America, and the Caribbean,” Hill said on Friday, noting that he is working with the PAJ to make it a reality.
For more than a decade, respective administrations have discussed the idea of establishing a SEZ at Caymanas. It is yet to be seen if this latest push by the Holness administration will materialise.