NEWS
Promoters: Safe-zone Carnival events will encourage more vaccinations
The Trinidad and Tobago Promoters Association (TTPA) says it believes more people will be encouraged to become vaccinated one the approval for safe-zone Carnival events is given. The association’s president, Jerome Precilla, at a news conference at Queen’s Hall, St Ann’s, on Wednesday, called for the reopening of the events sector and for the green light to be given for planning Carnival 2023. Read more here
TT Chamber CEO: Renewables, digitisation – pathways to new investments
The idea of shifting to renewable energy was not a bad one, says new CEO of the Trinidad and Tobago Chamber of Industry and Commerce Ian De Souza, but it required a lot of investment and culture change for it to make a difference. In an interview with Business Day last week, he said while climate change needed to be tackled from a larger perspective and globally, the thrust by small island developing states (SIDS) to play their part and facilitate change was overwhelming. Read more here
POLITICS
THA launches parallel health system to fight Omicron
In preparation for what the Tobago House of Assembly (THA) is calling a “surge in Omicron cases,” Tobago, for the first time, will soon have a parallel health care system. Speaking at the THA’s post-Executive Council media briefing yesterday, Augustine said he is hoping to have the system up and running by February 2. He said the old Scarborough Regional Hospital will be converted into an infectious disease control centre. Currently, COVID-19 patients are being kept there but anyone needing Intensive Care Unit (ICU) treatment is transferred to the Scarborough General Hospital. Read more here
BUSINESS
T&T—its own worst enemy
The furore surrounding the unfortunate comments by Miss World T&T contestant Jeanine Brandt is warranted as it shows that, at best, she has no idea of T&T’s poverty levels, its institutions and the billions of taxpayers dollars spent to protect the most vulnerable in the society. I am happy she has apologised after facing mounting pressure from citizens who could not countenance the country she described; one of thousands of children not knowing where their next meal was coming from, or who are sleeping on cold floors and had no access to healthcare. She appeared to forget that public healthcare in T&T does not come with a cost to the user and children are always considered a priority in the healthcare system. Read more here
REGIONAL
Guyana could earn around US$86M from ninth oil lift
With global oil prices now at the highest level in seven years, Guyana’s prospects of earning more money from its next oil lift is greater than ever before. At end of Tuesday, the cost for Brent – the benchmark Guyana uses to sell its crude – stood at approximately US$86 per barrel. Should this remain the case when the country sells its ninth one-million-barrels of oil in the coming weeks, the sale could rake in as much as US$86 million. Read more here
INTERNATIONAL
Ukraine tension: Biden says he thinks Putin will 'move in'
US President Joe Biden has said he thinks his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin will "move in" on Ukraine but does not want "full-blown war". He told a news conference Mr Putin would pay a "serious and dear price" for invading, but indicated a minor incursion might be treated differently. The White House later stressed any Russian military move would be met with a swift, severe response from the West. The Kremlin warned the comments could further destabilise the situation. Russia has some 100,000 troops near the border but denies planning an invasion. President Putin has made a series of demands to the West, insisting Ukraine should never be allowed to join Nato and that the defensive alliance abandons military activity in Eastern Europe. Read more here
20th January 2022