The hosting of the Cricket World Cup in 2007 will present many business opportunities for Caribbean firms and so many are positioning themselves to take advantage of this momentous occasion for the region.

Jamaica's public sector business opportunity arm JAMPRO has commissioned one of the world's leading event legacy planners David Faulks to evaluate and plan what business opportunities can be extracted once the World Cup has been concluded and the winner declared.

David Faulks is an event legacy-planning expert based in Australia. He has worked on the Sydney Olympic Games and other leading sporting events in North America and Europe, more particularly on the Rugby World Cup. He intends to draw upon what he has learnt from past experiences on how a host city and country can leverage some long-term value from the hosting of a major sporting event.

Speaking with the Caribbean Business Report from Jamaica, he said: "It's all to do with how we can accelerate some processes rather than seeing the event as an end in itself. What JAMPRO has been developing is a strategy that has a vision that looks beyond the World Cup. We have a vision that looks to 2012 and in essence that entails the acceleration of the development of the creative industries sector. We are looking to diversify the market mix and proactively attract some new investment into the country and direct these investments into some strategic projects."

What JAMPRO has done in conjunction with Faulks is map out a number of targeted development areas; these include enterprise, trade, investments and tourism. They are also looking at both sports and community development. The aim here is to also shift the perception of what Jamaica as a brand means.

Francis. head of JAMPRO

The key here is to look beyond the event and so a long-term strategy has to be employed. That being said, there is an immediate requirement to inform, educate and link the local enterprise to everything that exists around the cricket World Cup. But at the end of the day that is not the responsibility of the organisers of the event. Jamaica is committed to doing something about that and informing local enterprises about the available opportunities.

"An immediate priority is to establish an enterprise development initiative, which will help to link local enterprise with opportunities around the event and to look for some international partnerships with some of the participating countries. We have 18 months in which to get ready and much of the preparation must begin now.

"I must say that this project has much more potential than a lot of other projects I have worked on including some very sophisticated cities. There are a lot of opportunities here but we have to accelerate some development and co-ordinate our efforts. So one of the challenges has been to adopt a team approach with the various business groups and there is an incredibly strong commitment from them. We have to get things moving because we have to be activated in the next six months," said Faulks.

The Caribbean's unique strengths

Having worked around the world, what does Faulks see as the Caribbean's main strengths?

The prince of West Indies cricket, Brian Lara, is expected to be one of the stars of Cricket World Cup 2007.

He draws attention to the fact that he is employed specifically to Jamaica but notes that the Caribbean's energy and creativity makes it ideal for this upcoming event. He surmises that this is largely untapped and somewhat fragmented. He says that it should be drawn together, packaged well so that people from around the world can better connect with it.
"A particular strength of Jamaica is while it is perceived as an inward-looking country, by its very nature it is a globally oriented country. With its successes in music and sport it is recognised internationally. What we need to do is ensure that Jamaica is recognised for the right things. The key is what messages do we want to communicate and how are we going to get them out there most effectively. Other attractions? Well, the Caribbean is a beautiful place and people around the world associate it with paradise on earth and that is a very good drawing card right there."

The importance of being globally focused cannot be understated because if the Caribbean is not, it will miss a big opportunity with this World Cup. The salient issue here is how does one derive a greater value through the relationships with other countries participating in the event and /or those who are receiving the broadcast. The Caribbean has to be conscious that it will be connecting with people in other countries so the strategy has to be internationally focused and locally oriented.

Faulks reflects that for the Sydney Olympics, both the city and the country failed to fully and effectively leverage the event into the future. The Olympics brought in approximately US$1 billion (primary impact) and US$500,000 (secondary impact) million in additional trade and investments. That US$500,000 million impact is extra value it would not have got if it did not put in place certain strategies to do so. He is helping JAMPRO with this secondary impact, leveraging the event into further financial gain.

"For the Sydney Olympics we could have done even better if we had been a bit more visionary in terms of thinking beyond the event. As far as Jamaica is concerned it is very important that we think 2012 rather than 2007. When the event leaves here we want to ensure we have some connectivity moving forward and get some growth out of it. I cannot stress enough that whatever is developed has to have a relevance to the local community. The business communities are going to want to know what is in this for them and we have to provide the answers. We have to be honest about things that are not going to be an opportunity for people so that there are no misconceptions floating around," said Faulks.

JAMPRO is now working on an information hub, which disseminates information on all available business opportunities in Jamaica and throughout the Caribbean. Its President Patricia Francis said: "There will be a web site aimed at companies worldwide outlining the opportunities from this event, in other words there will be an international tender. There will not be overt privileges for local companies, so things will get very competitive. However, where local companies cannot supply certain services they may well be able to do so as sub-contractors. For example, there may well be a need to add in special seating for the stadium and a Jamaican company, while not being able to do so, may well be able to install them. We will compile a profile of many businesses and what they are able to contribute. This will allow us to present local companies in appropriate fields of expertise to form working partnerships, which can endure long after the World Cup. We are confident that there will be significant incremental value to the Jamaican economy and businesses as a whole as a result of the greatest cricketing show on earth taking place right here."

I don't see why a company like J Wray & Nephew can't be exposed to an Indian company and from there form a deal placing its products in one of the world's largest markets.
This is precisely why we have formed a business club with both local and international firms where deals of this nature can be done. So far we have had a positive response from many private sector groups and both Noel DaCosta of the Jamaica Chamber of Commerce (JCC) and Dr Andre Gordon of the Jamaica Exporters Association (JEA) have been most helpful. Barbados' preparations are going well and Jamaica as a whole must recognise that this is a big opportunity for us."

Francis also said that JAMPRO is working with other interest groups to enhance the visitor experience. With the event taking place over 51 days, seven of those days will be in Jamaica. There will be a need to provide services when the matches are not on and this should provide a boon to tourism and retailing. It is here that Francis sees the importance of community development.

Between 2006 and 2012 Francis says JAMPRO is expecting to see 80 new investment projects as a result of Cricket World Cup 2007 and is targeting revenues of US$3 billion.

As far as trade is concerned, JAMPRO hopes to see a 5 per cent increase in exports for the six year period. It is also hoping to see an increase by 10 per cent in tourism visitor expenditure. Sales from local industries to tourism now stands at US$29 million. JAMPRO is targeting domestic sales of US$50 million in that time frame.

Importantly, it sees the international media exposure netting Jamaica US$150 million which works out to be US$2 million a day.

The hosting of the opening ceremony
The opening ceremony for the Cricket World Cup 2007 will take place in Greenfields, Trelawny, and seven games including the semi-final will take place at Sabina Park. There are those that argue that with the existing infrastructure Sabina Park would be the better bet for the opening ceremony. But by having it at Greenfields the arena will be subsequently used as a multi-purpose facility thereby underscoring Faulks' point.

"The decision has been made and we just have to make the most of it. The one comment I will make is that in terms of the legacy beyond the games you have to consider the strategic use of the facilities beyond the event. This has happened with all the major events I have been involved in. The issue with Greenfields, Trelawny, is not about what takes place with the event, the critical thing here is what is that asset going to be used for in the long term and what kind of return will you get. By return I don't just mean financial. It has to be tangible and it has to benefit the community. Most of the best sports facilities around the world are multi- purposed and that is the critical thing here.

Greenfields may well attract other countries and sporting entities to come and use its facilities (training camps, retreats) and so this can become an additional revenue stream. The hosting of this event should become a launch pad for an ongoing programme of major event attractions. It is a cut-throat business so the quality of the facilities you have and the way you package them (with tourism, hospitality, entertainment) is vitally important for drumming up business."

He points to his work on baseball camps in Australia. This is not a sport that the country is well known for, but it has a very good facility on the Gold Coast. That part of the country attracts many Japanese tourists. One of the Japanese professional teams holds its training camp on the Gold Coast. Now close by the facility is a local jeans/surferwear shop where the team went in there and bought everything in the shop.

He says that the Sydney Olympic games were perhaps the first to have a leverage strategy that worked and through that experience other countries have learnt how to apply that.
Faulks believes that the Sydney Olympics are still the stand-out example. But in his opinion no one will ever do as well as the Chinese will do with Beijing 2008.

"The amount of energy and effort they are putting into their games as a way to position themselves in the world is impressive. The Chinese are very good at learning from other people and that event will truly be something to behold and so too will be its event legacy planning. Over the last 10 to 15 years we have seen co-ordinated strategies with the world's leading sporting events. In Utah, the Salt Lake Winter Olympic Games particularly stands out. There they had a participating countries centre network. Utah branded itself excellently. It was known as church/bible belt country but it re-positioned itself as a hub of emerging industries. Part of their strategy was leveraging the torch relay through different cities. Now Utah has about the same population as Jamaica and I thought they did very well."

Cricket Academy
With the collapse of West Indies cricket there is now a call for a structured viable cricket academy that will help to return the West Indies to those halcyon days of the '70s and '80s.
Today, Australia is the world's leading cricketing nation and this it attributes to its academy. Ten of its present squad are products of its academy.

What is very clear is that you do have to invest if you are going to achieve a sustainable success in any sport. Jamaican athletics have been very successful despite the absence of a structured and well-financed academy but that is the exception rather than the rule.

"Australia performed appallingly at the Montreal Olympic Games and that was a catalyst for the Government to say we need to put some systems and strategies in place. The Australian Institute of Sport emerged from that and the Government invests US$100 million a year in sport. As a result of that Australia has managed to sustain success in many sports of which one of them is cricket.

"What happens with sporting talent is you have huge fluctuations in performance. The key is to minimise your dips.
In order to do so you have to get to a consistent level of performance across key aspects of the sport. It's not just about skill, its strength and conditioning, the psychological element. Now how do you do that? You have to have some systems in place to achieve that. I think the West Indies has the opportunity to put in place a high-performance centre but it requires an investment.

"Now none of that is any good if you don't broaden the base of sporting participation. You have to channel people through a pathway to get to that sort of academy structure.

Kids must be participating in the right sorts of competition with the right sorts of coaches and proper talent identification. I must say that this is just my general view because I have not been commissioned to look at West Indian sporting academies."

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