European Union ambassador to T&T, Peter Cavendish, says in terms of this country’s economic future there is a need to rebalance the country’s energy production with the output of other products. Speaking to Sunday Business Guardian, following the ‘Shaping the Future of Innovation Awards’ (STFOI) ceremony’ at the Hyatt last week, Cavendish said as it relates to Europe, it is secured in many areas including trade, in which the group of countries meets the demands of its population.
He noted that T&T has good fashion, food, and construction products along with Information Technology people. “This country has one of the highest engineers per head in the population of the Americas. We need these types of people in Europe and we obviously want to trade more with T&T. At the moment the ball is in T&T’s court with the huge surplus that you have.” Cavendish highlighted.
In terms of digital connectivity, he said the EU is approaching a deeper level of exchange, with the extension of the super-connectivity cable called BELLA, which stands for Building the Europe Links with Latin America. The objective of this cable is to connect educational and research networks (ERNs), for example the University of West Indies and the University of T&T, together with third-level bodies in Europe, Latin America, and elsewhere in the Caribbean region.
Continuing on the topic of diversification, Cavendish said the European Union at the ceremony handed out grants to 25 awardees, with the range being between US$50,000 to US$70,000 per recipient. He said the EU has been supporting this initiative, along with the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) Lab, and the Caribbean Industrial Research Institute (Cariri) for the past three to four years.
