Haiti’s Private Sector Discusses Bi-national Trade Issues

Haiti’s Private Sector Economic Forum (FESP) and Chamber of Commerce and Industry (CCIH) organized a workshop on commercial relations and trade of goods and services between Haiti and the Dominican Republic on April 21st with the support of The Caribbean Export Development Agency (Caribbean Export).

The event, which was attended by key private sector representatives from the Haitian industrial sector, provided a space to discuss the progress of the Memorandum of Understanding signed between the Ministries of Commerce of both countries and facilitated the exchange of information and statistics on bilateral trade.   

During the workshop, the importance of effective border control to reduce informal trade, illegal smuggling of contraband, etc was highlighted as a priority issue together with the lack of trustworthy data and statistics on binational trade of goods and services because it hinders the ability to determine a proper course of action.  In addition the need for public/private sector consensus to propose concrete actions required to implement the Memorandum of Understanding was also highlighted as a priority.
As a result of this dialogue, the Haitian private sector has reached consensus on key points and is ready to engage the public sector in order to define a common agenda and plan of action to address the obstacles affecting bilateral trade.
Opening remarks were delivered by Mr. Gregory Brandt, FESP Coordinator, Mr. Jean-Claude Meriné, Deputy Programme Manager, Caribbean Export, while the closing comments were given by Mrs. Martine Cullivy of the Haitian Chamber of Commerce and Industry.
Caribbean Export co-organized this event within the framework of the Haiti/Dominican Republic Binational Programme, funded by the European Union under the 10th European Development Fund (EDF).