Congratulations to the dynamic Marlene Street-Forrest, general manager of the Jamaica Stock Exchange (JSE), and her hard-working team; their extraordinary efforts have earned them Bloomberg’s rating as the number one performing stock exchange in the world in 2015!

Marlene Street-Forrest has noted international interest in Jamaica’s firms: Heineken NV’s purchase of Red Stripe/Desnoes & Geddes saw those shares soaring by 500 per cent and a Mexican company acquired majority shares in the Burrowes family’s Dolphin Cove.

The Jamaica Stock Exchange started operations in 1969, founded by Willard Samms, Raglan Golding, Edward Gayle, and Anthony Lloyd. The palms around their building at 40 Harbour Street bring back memories of driving with my Dad along the palm-lined driveway of the Myrtle Bank Hotel which was at that very location.

How the business district of downtown Kingston has developed since then: it holds great promise, as does the tourism, agriculture, real estate, and manufacturing sectors of Jamaica. The world is discovering the potential of our beloved country, the largest English-speaking Caribbean island, set squarely in the centre of the Americas.

Years ago, I decided to become a ‘penny stockholder’ in the companies served by our agency — this gave a deeper understanding of the businesses, as I listened to the concerns of shareholders, large and small, at the annual general meetings. My friend, the late Basil Buck, owner of Buck Securities, organised for these share purchases and made a few suggestions which turned out to be excellent.

Then, when we handled the publicity for the Junior Market listings of the Lasco companies about five years ago, we suggested reserving shares for teachers, nurses and police officers, for whom our shop had developed affirmation programmes. The awareness sessions went well, bringing in hundreds of new participants in Jamaica’s stock market.

The

Bloomberg website notes that the JSE has launched the Caribbean’s first online trading platform. This has inspired Denis St Bernard, a London-based business consultant, to start “a diaspora-focused investment company that would pool contributions”. St Bernard noted that the opportunities are with known Jamaican brands such as GraceKennedy.

Investment guru Sushil Jain has been an enthusiastic supporter of Blue Chip Jamaican companies listed on the JSE. “Why wouldn’t you want to have people like Don Wehby and Patrick Hylton working for you?” he asked. Let us make financial literacy a priority so that ordinary Jamaicans can tap into every opportunity for wealth creation.

Our misplaced anger

We have had some interesting video clips over the years of angry orange and green politicians. Jamaica Labour Party Member of Parliament Everald ‘Warring’ Warmington could face possible suspension from the House as a result of his disrespectful outburst against People’s National Party MP Lisa Hanna. What continues to surprise us, are the matters that make our politicians angry. It was the poet e e cummings (sic) who said of his father, “His anger was as right as rain.” We are not sure if this can be said about our politicians

Here are a few issues that should make our representatives angry:

• The murder rate — Comparisons to other administrations do not help our hapless citizens. Both parties have not done enough while in office to ensure the safety of Jamaicans, especially those who cannot afford fancy security systems.

• Our environment — The litter, the garbage, the choked waterways, the sewage on the streets of some communities; the poor are sitting ducks for the Zika virus. What are our over 200 parish councillors doing about this?

• Unemployment — How long have we been saying that our education system should be producing employable individuals? Good plumbers and electricians are in demand, and earning well. What about incentives for small and medium businesses so they can provide more employment?

Instead, we are seeing personal attacks geared at scoring political points. I am pleading with our media colleagues not to give so much oxygen to these time wasters in the House. Let us focus on urgent nation building imperatives, and call out our representatives to do better.

Great tour of duty, Paola Amadei

European Union Ambassador Paola Amadei completed an energetic four-year tour of duty in Jamaica and other Caribbean and Latin American countries. She celebrated Jamaica’s 40-year partnership with the European Union last year. We have received magnanimous funding in the areas of poverty reduction, education, agriculture, housing, health, and gender equality. Her passion for gender equality was a special feature at a farewell event held in her honour last week. We were invited to sign our support at the UN’s

HeforShe.org website, and all the gentlemen in the room joined her for a “HeforShe” moment. (@souldancing)

Ambassador Amadei will not be abandoning her ties with our region. She heads to Germany, where she will take up the post of executive director of the European Union-Latin America & Caribbean (EU-LAC) Foundation. We thank her for her generous engagement in Jamaica and send best wishes to her and her family.

Japan donates ambulance fleet

The Government of Japan handed over a fleet of six well-equipped ambulances to the St John Ambulance Brigade last week at King’s House. Patron Governor General Sir Patrick Allen thanked Japan’s Ambassador to Jamaica Masanori Nakano and reminded us of the value of goodwill: “Goodwill is one of the most basic qualities of the human being and the great untapped resources at the heart of every human community… as the very famous American merchandiser, Marshall Field, once said, ‘Goodwill is the only asset that competition cannot undersell or destroy.’ ”

Wearing yet another hat, Earl Jarrett, chairman of the St John Ambulance Council, lauded the volunteers of the brigade who display such care and concern, particularly Nurse Marie Clemetson, who recently received a papal award for over 60 years’ service to church and community.

Farewell, Prof Trevor Jackson

We lost a great friend and colleague when Professor Trevor Jackson passed away last week in his native Trinidad. The former head of the University of the West Indies Department of Geology at Mona, Prof Jackson was a passionate environmentalist and a devout member of the Aquinas Centre Roman Catholic Church, where he led the St Vincent de Paul Outreach Programme. An advocate of seniors’ rights, he was a founding board director of the Caribbean Community of Retired Persons. The thanksgiving service for his wonderful life takes place tomorrow morning at St Joseph Catholic Church, Maracas, St Joseph, Trinidad. We mourn with his beloved wife Jean, children Susan and David, and grandson, Jordan.