BARBADOS | CARICOM Anticipates August 4 Opening of Afreximbank Regional Headquarters in Barbados says Mottley

PORT-OF-SPAIN Trinidad and Tobago, July 21, 2023 - Barbados Prime Minister Mia Amor Mottley says the the Caribbean Community eagerly anticipates the effective linking of a fully constructed CARICOM Single Market and Economy to a fully integrated and operational “African Continental Free Trade Area” – undergirded by air, maritime and telecommunications connectivity between the Caribbean and Africa. 

Addressing an online  Global Africa People-to-People Forum this morning, prime minister Mottley, in examining  the progress of  the partnership between the African Export-Import Bank and the Caribbean Community, described the establishment of the Afreximbank as one of the most outstanding Pan-African achievements of our era.

“It is therefore this outstanding African success story that we will be formally and substantively welcoming to our Caribbean Community in just over two weeks time,  when the President of Afreximbank-Professor Benedict Oramah-and his Executive Management team arrive in my own country of Barbados to officially open Afreximbank's spanking new Caribbean headquarters,” Prime Minister Mottley said.

She noted that all of the governments of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) that have already signed on to the Partnership Agreement with Afreximbank are looking forward to the opening of the bank’s regional headquarters in Barbados.

Afreximbank has also already introduced numerous African investors to our region, and has provided the financial guarantees that have facilitated several projects to get off the ground.

In addition,  she said “ Afreximbank's financial experts are currently deeply engaged with our Central Banks to work out a modality for extending the Pan-African Payments and Settlement System to our region,  and with our CARICOM Development Fund (CDF) to design new financial instruments that will mobilize a significant portion of the vast sum of capital lodged in the banking system of CARICOM and make it available for development purposes.”

The Barbados Prime Minister reiterated that “ the Directors of the bank have already allocated the capital sum of US $1.5 Billion to finance trade and investment between Africa and the Caribbean, and have promised to double that allocation if and when the remaining CARICOM member states sign on to the Partnership.”

She said “this institution that was established in the year 1994  is much more than just a bank, pointing out that the Afreximbank Group includes an Insurance Management Agency,  an intra-African Payment and Settlement System (PAPSS), a Dubai-based Credit Fund,  a quality infrastructure company that provides testing, inspection and certification services across Africa, a specialist hospital development entity,  and an industrial infrastructure development company.

“ We are determined to reverse the negative and evil historical Middle Passage, and reimagine and reconstruct  it in a positive way to serve our own interests and purposes,” PM Mottley pointed out.

“We in the Caribbean Community are determined to reclaim our Atlantic destiny, to reconnect with our African “heartland”, and to realize the dreams and aspirations of the Hon. Marcus Mosiah Garvey and so many other of our outstanding Pan-Africanists, on both sides of the Atlantic ocean, and Afreximbank is simply playing a role in helping us to accomplish this,” she concluded”. 

The Afreximbank Partnership Agreement was launched on 1 September 2022, at the first Africa-Caribbean Trade and Investment Forum (ACTIF) held in Bridgetown, Barbados, at which time nine CARICOM member countries acceded to the agreement.

The Board of the African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) has made available US$1.5 billion, to enable CARICOM member states that have ratified the Partnership Agreement with Afreximbank, to tap into the Bank’s various financial instruments.

This amount is expected to jump to US3-billion, if and when the other member states sign on. Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago are yet to accede to the agreement.

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