US backs deeper economic ties with T&T

The Unit­ed States Gov­ern­ment is work­ing to sup­port pri­vate sec­tor projects in Trinidad and To­ba­go as both coun­tries seek to deep­en in­vest­ment and trade ties.

US Deputy Sec­re­tary of State Christo­pher Lan­dau made the com­mit­ment dur­ing a pri­vate sec­tor din­ner host­ed by the Amer­i­can Cham­ber of Com­merce of Trinidad and To­ba­go (AM­CHAM T&T) and the US Em­bassy on Mon­day.

Lan­dau said re­cent in­vest­ments and con­tin­ued in­ter­est by US firms in Trinidad and To­ba­go pro­vide rea­sons for op­ti­mism about the fu­ture of eco­nom­ic re­la­tions be­tween the two coun­tries.

He said com­mer­cial ties are an of­ten-un­der­val­ued tool in de­vel­op­ing re­la­tions be­tween states and that more could be done to strength­en eco­nom­ic co­op­er­a­tion.

The Au­gust 10 en­gage­ment brought to­geth­er se­nior US Gov­ern­ment of­fi­cials and rep­re­sen­ta­tives from Trinidad and To­ba­go’s pri­vate sec­tor to dis­cuss “T&T’s Next Chap­ter: En­er­gy, In­vest­ment, and Sup­ply Chain Se­cu­ri­ty”.

Lan­dau said the US Gov­ern­ment is ac­tive­ly work­ing to sup­port pri­vate sec­tor projects that can ben­e­fit the lo­cal econ­o­my and fur­ther deep­en eco­nom­ic ties be­tween the two coun­tries.

AM­CHAM T&T Pres­i­dent An­na Hen­der­son said the en­gage­ment pro­vid­ed an op­por­tu­ni­ty for mem­bers of the busi­ness com­mu­ni­ty to en­gage di­rect­ly with se­nior US Gov­ern­ment lead­er­ship on is­sues that will in­flu­ence Trinidad and To­ba­go’s eco­nom­ic fu­ture.

AM­CHAM T&T CEO Ni­rad Tewarie said stronger re­la­tion­ships are built through di­a­logue and that such en­gage­ments could help iden­ti­fy ar­eas for deep­er co­op­er­a­tion be­tween Trinidad and To­ba­go and the Unit­ed States.

The din­ner in­clud­ed US Em­bassy of­fi­cials and se­nior rep­re­sen­ta­tives from ma­jor pri­vate sec­tor com­pa­nies.