1. Ministry of Industry, Investment and Commerce
Mobile Business Clinic Initiative
Santa Cruz
Tuesday April 28th, 2015
An EEPIC Journey to grow fast, fast, fast and so realise a Billion
Dollars Export Vision by 2030
Silburn Clarke, Chairman, Jamaica Business Development Corporation
Good Morning St Elizabeth!!
Salutations:
Master of Ceremonies
Hon Anthony Hylton, Minister of Industry, Investment and Commerce
Mayor of Santa Cruz, Everton Fisher
Title Sponsors NCB and their Santa Cruz Team represented by Conroy Ward
Manager for the Santa Cruz Branch
Representative of Nissan, Fidelity Motors our other Title Sponsor for the
Mobile Business Clinic Initiative
Members of staff of the JBDC
Members of the Ministry of Industry Investment and Commerce
Representatives of other Ministries Departments and Agencies teaming with
MIIC and JBDC in the rollout of the Mobile Business Clinic Initiative
Representatives of other Sponsors
Entrepreneurs all
Greetings again !!
Its good to be here with you this morning in the best parish in Jamaica !!
If I sound like I have a slight bias, then you may be right.

2. Ministry of Industry, Investment and Commerce
Mobile Business Clinic Initiative
Santa Cruz
Tuesday April 28th, 2015
That’s because my navel string is buried in this parish in a place up north called Carisbrook near a
district called White Hill
I am descended from the Marshall lineage; Are there any Marshalls in the house ?
My wider roots are in what I call the Tri-State Area …. My grandparents hail from
Westmoreland, St. Elizabeth and Manchester; Again the Tri-State Area is best region in the
entire country !
So its good to be here with you.
Now this is my fourth Parish Business Clinic launch
And for this launch I want to engage with you at a different level.
In our previous launches we gave a lot of props to our hard-working micro-entrepreneurs.
This morning, however, I want to slant my remarks more towards our SME’s ; and in particular I
want to address those of our SME’s that are currently exporting or that are export-oriented.
Let me see the hands of our micro-businesses folks in the audience
Let me see the hands of our small and medium-businesses folks
Finally, let me see the hands of the exporters amongst us
So my remarks this morning will be covering three themes:
Our EEPIC Journey
For SME firms to grow really fast
In order to achieve a 2030 Billion Dollars Vison
The JBDC is on a path to pay even greater attention than ever before to our SME clients
Last year our internal analysis indicated that 92%-95% of our clients were classified as micro-
entrepreneurs and just 5%-8% were classified as Small and Medium Entrepreneurs.

3. Ministry of Industry, Investment and Commerce
Mobile Business Clinic Initiative
Santa Cruz
Tuesday April 28th, 2015
Historically we have paid a lot of attention and directed a lot of resources to the micro-enterprise
sector
However, commencing in 2015 – 2016 the JBDC will be instituting the strategic re-direction to
give more attention to our Small and Medium Enterprises.
Over the last year we have been on what I will describe as an EEPIC Journey.
What do we mean by EEPIC ?
At our strategic level, we have been seriously examining those strategies that we can deploy to
transform the performance output of our SME’s
To kick this off, we instituted what we termed the EEPIC Forum series in our monthly Board
Meetings which represents our strategic intent aimed at :
Enhancing Enterprise Productivity, Innovation and Competitiveness
And I want to spend a little time speaking about this topic which is very critical to our country
achieving fast, fast, fast growth.
For the last 40 years the World Bank tells us that Jamaica’s average annual economic growth rate
was 0.8%. Further the World Bank tells us that 0.8% growth places us as the worst performing
economy among the over 150 countries globally.
But being Marcus Garvey’s children we must not make these failings from our past define our
future. We must learn from history and set new trajectories going forward. Because like you I am
of the firm belief that we can grow fast.
On the other hand we are advised from the Jamaica Productivity Centre, over in the Ministry of
Labour, that the productivity of our firms, over the same period , has steadily declined
In fact it is projected that were we to continue, unchanged, on the same declining productivity
projection that we are on right now, that we will be less productive in 2030 than we are now.
What makes 2030 important? That’s the year that we have set ourselves to as a country to
achieve first-world, or developed country, status.
2030 is a mere 15 years away !
And so if we were to continue with weak productivity and with low growth, we would
compromise our ability to achieve our Vision 2030 goals.

4. Ministry of Industry, Investment and Commerce
Mobile Business Clinic Initiative
Santa Cruz
Tuesday April 28th, 2015
But again I declare that we must not make these past histories define our future. Again it is within
our powers and capabilities to set new trajectories for productivity going forward.
Now what, if any, is the connection between the 0.8% average economic growth and the declining
productivity?
The two are intimately connected.
So let’s ask ourselves, where does economic growth come from ?
Well, firstly, it comes from lots of economic activities by entrepreneurs like yourself
But not just any economic activity
If we look back into Jamaica’s history, we will readily see, and admit, that the times that our
economy has done really well, occurs only when our firms do well abroad; that is when we export
or otherwise earn income from overseas
So when the Sugar Industry was doing well we did well
And when the Banana Industry was doing well we did well
When the Bauxite and Alumina industry was doing well we also did well,
When the Tourism industry does well we do well
And when Remittances are growing ………
Mind you Remittances are not really applicable but I have thrown it in for good measure to
illustrate the point that we do well when we earn or otherwise when foreign dollars flow into the
country.
So what’s the morale of the story: It is this….when we do well abroad, when we have foreign
dollars flowing into the country, our local economy does well.
And therein lies the lesson for us
We can’t have a discussion about Economic Growth and SME’s and not talk about exports
The “lots of economic activity” that I spoke about earlier, has to be export-related activities
For our economy to do really well our firms must be very competitive on the markets of the world
outside of Jamaica. In other words, for our economic growth rate to get better than the paltry
0.8% average per annum which we mentioned earlier, our firms must be delivering goods and
services at a world-class level to the discriminating consumers of the globe.
And by discriminating I am talking about, consumers that demand high quality goods and services,
delivered within an attractive packaging, offered at an attractive price and on a timely basis.

5. Ministry of Industry, Investment and Commerce
Mobile Business Clinic Initiative
Santa Cruz
Tuesday April 28th, 2015
But where do competitive firms come from ?
Where do the firms that have the confidence and ability to enter the world stage and take on
“whosoever may come” come from ?
Studies the world over tell us that those firms that tend to do well in the global marketplace, tend
to be those firms that practice and enjoy high levels of productivity ; essentially they are the ones
delivering higher levels of production output with fewer resources when compared with other
firms.
So the next question becomes, where does high productivity firms come from?
They come from workplaces where their leaders and workers are highly innovative
And by innovative I mean that there is a constant improvement in the way that the business is
done
In general, innovation comes from workplaces where the workers in the firm are highly
motivated, are well trained; are committed; and where the leadership of the firm is supportive,
ethical and trustworthy; the leaders challenge their staff to achieve their highest potential; and are
very smart in their identification, selection and engagement of technology
And so those leaders in firms that are able to wisely blend the talent of their employees with
appropriate technology and that can motivate that talent to be engaged with their firms mission
and goals, will over time enjoy high innovation levels
And to be clear, innovation, or continuous improvements, occurs at all levels of the firm and with
all firm sizes
A couple examples:
a honey producer that is able to design a cost-effective way to move her boxes around in order to
reap larger volumes of the honey from logwood blossoms, during the narrow window that the
logwood blooms, and so be able to ship a pure logwood honey product into export markets, is
also being innovative
Or, a forklift driver who suggests , to management, better ways on how to stack pallets in a
warehouse and so save time and money when that suggestion is implemented is also being
innovative.
The essence of these two stories is that “Innovation is everybody’s business”
And so constant innovation leads to higher productivity;
Higher productivity leads to greater competitiveness; domestically but more importantly, globally
…..and the more our firms become competitive, then the better are our economic growth
prospects

6. Ministry of Industry, Investment and Commerce
Mobile Business Clinic Initiative
Santa Cruz
Tuesday April 28th, 2015
And so I end with an appeal, a charge and an invitation
Firstly, as we take a look around the world at those successful economies and societies, we clearly
see that the best way for a country to lift the standard of living of its citizens, and to rapidly lift our
people out of poverty, is to “grow really, really fast and get increased income”
The economies of Asia are exemplars of this… especially the Chinese economy
President Obama reminded our young future leaders, and all of us, of this fact on his historic visit
earlier this month
Secondly, in order to enjoy competitiveness against your global rivals, you need to be innovative
and to be highly productive
Finally, to the Entrepreneurs and Leaders of firms, the innovativeness and productivity of your
firm rest in your hands; in how you shape the workplace into a welcoming, empowering
environment that sustains a motivated, innovative, productive space and so continually deliver
enhanced competitiveness.
My charge to you is to shape your workplaces to be zones where ideas and suggestions flow freely
and where great ideas are acknowledged and the best of the best of the best of those ideas are
implemented
So in closing, let me share a Vision 2030 goal of mine. Imagine a Jamaica where we have a
thousand innovative, high productivity and highly competitive SME firms each earning one million
US dollars. What would the overall export earnings of this group of SME’s be ?
One billion US dollars !! ………………….. I repeat; One billion US dollars !!
This is over half of our current export earnings today……. And so would represent more than a
50% increase on our current export performance….Can we drive ourselves to execute and achieve
this goal within the next 15 years.
I think we can……………We can do it !
And so I invite our SMEs of St Elizabeth to be part of this 2030 Billion Dollar Club by committing to
creating competitive businesses built on innovativeness and high productivity and in so doing to
grow the wealth of their businesses, their employees and their country really fast, so that Jamaica
under God can find its destined proper place among the successful economies and societies of the
world.
Thank you