Anupam Govil, outsourcing consultant, thinks Jamaica could more than double its business process outsourcing (BPO) earnings to US$1 billion ($115b) annually, provided the island offers higher skills solutions for clients.

It comes as Government seeks to double industry jobs to 34,000 in five years amid a global shift for higher skilled services.

“Easily, I believe Jamaica can have a US$-billion industry in the next three to five years. That will not only come from growth in numbers but jobs that give greater yield,” he told a panel discussion at the Jamaica Investment Forum 2015 held at the Montego Bay Convention Centre in St James on Thursday.

The forum aims to convince prospective foreign investors to invest by essentially offering stakeholder case studies from various sectors within the island.

Govil indicated that he set up outsourcing centres in some 40 countries and compared the earnings of Jamaica with that of Uruguay — both of which have similar-sized populations. Govil who is also a partner at international-based Avasant management consulting company, indicated that the island earns roughly half that of Uruguay.

“Uruguay is probably one of the least densely populated nations in the world…about three million so it’s about the size of Jamaica. But the industry in 2013 earned US$700 million in revenue and Jamaica is at about US$300 to US$480 million. The point is we have to start thinking of how we can get better yield by going up the value chain,” Govil reasoned.

The comparison resonates as Jamaica’s geographic proximity and common language to the USA were still insufficient to match Uruguay.

Yoni Epstein, chairman of the Business Process Industry Association of Jamaica and also chief executive officer at Itel-BPO Solutions, chaired the panel discussion on Thursday.

Presenters included Sharon Ffolkes Abrahams, state minister in the Ministry of Industry who agreed that the sector needs to secure higher-valued skill sets including animators, software application developers, legal processing agents and virtual office assistants.

Colin Barnett, manager at the state-led Heart Trust NTA, which conducted research on the sector in 2014 projects said that jobs are set to double by 2020.

“We have 17,000 workers employed now and the plan is to double that to more than 34,000 employees in the next five years,” stated Barnett.

Serena Godfrey, general manager at Vistaprint Jamaica, argued that call centres must invest in staff, or otherwise expect high attrition.

“You can have the prettiest building, the best IT infrastructure but if you don’t take care of the people then you get nothing out of it,” Godfrey stated in an effort to debunk the perception that the industry must have a high attrition rate for call agents.

“The average tenure is four years on the production floor, seven years for managers. They get offers every day and turn them down, because if you have a great culture, then people will stay.”