Finding opportunities in challenges

Barbados’ international business sector has proven its resilience in the face of many obstacles it has confronted since its emergence more than three decades ago. And Global Business Week 2021 (GBW 2021) scheduled for October 24 to 30, is the forum at which key players and thought leaders are set to address the opportunities, challenges, current and expected developments, and the island’s responses.

Jamar Arthur-Selman, the First Vice-President of BIBA, The Association For Global Business, and chair of the steering committee for GBW 2021, is passionate about the sector’s ability to be sustained and to thrive.

Arthur-Selman, an attorney-at-law and general manager of Centralis Barbados Ltd, explained that the virtual event, GBW 2021, continues the theme Adapt. Evolve. Execute. Lead the Change which began last year.

“All countries that operate in the international financial service centre spaces across the globae, and the majority of which are small states in comparison to the countries they service, they all have had to constantly adapt to maintain their status. How well we are able to adapt and evolve answers the question as to whether the sector is on the way out or whether it is going to thrive. There are always opportunities, always shifts but within every challenge, there are opportunities. . . . If we act, if we adapt and evolve, then we can access those opportunities.”

Excited about the week and the marquee three-day conference themed The New Era of Global Business: 2021 And Beyond, Arthur-Selman touted the event’s attractiveness for key figures across all sectors seeking answers to pressing questions.

“We focus on the issues head-on, moving the discussions along on the matters and how we are going to face them. We also receive a regulatory update on what is happening within various departments.”

The BIBA director put it frankly, “global business is the business of Barbados, and it touches and concerns everyone”. (PR)