Industry leaders across various sectors have reiterated the need for the creation of policies that encourage the implementation and use of advanced technologies to enable economic diversification which they believe is critical to the transformation of the local economy.

Speaking at the recently concluded Economic Growth Forum series held by the Planning Institute of Jamaica (PIOJ) under its Growth Inducement Programme, leaders from the information communication technology (ICT), business, banking and trade industries said that digitisation through ICT was useful to the diversification process.

Vice-president of marketing at the Jamaica Promotions Corporation (Jampro) Gabriel Heron and deputy president for the Jamaica Technology and Digital Alliance (JTDA), formerly the Jamaica Computer Society, Jason Scott together highlighted nine industries which they believe could become more productive and economically impactful from using cutting-edge technologies.

These industries they said included: agriculture, agro-processing, manufacturing logistics/ distribution, renewable energy as well as services in the financial, outsourcing, health and legal sectors.

“There are numerous emerging and disruptive technologies currently at play; there is a need to make a comprehensive assessment of which is the best fit to drive and recover our economy,” Heron said in his presentation.

President of Jampro Diane Edwards added that diversification was definitely pinned to faster recovery and growth. She said that through a range of diverse projects, her organisation in fulfilling its mandate of international marketing and has been working to bring public and private investments together to foster growth in new areas.

She cited the Caymanas Special Economic Zone, Soapberry Wastewater Treatment and a Bamboo Bio Product as some opportunities among the public-private partnerships.

Project executive of the Private Sector Organisation of Jamaica (PSOJ) Access to Finance Facilitation Panel Programme (AFFP), Mark Tracey, further emphasised the need for new approaches by policymakers towards diversifying the economy, noting that the process must first begin by identifying world growth trends in the long run. He urged policymakers to diversify and target specific growth sectors, reinforce areas having comparative advantage, pivot where necessary and reshape the infrastructure to accommodate diversification into new products and markets.

“The Jamaican economy must be reshaped structurally to create a level of resilience and create robust economic growth. Some institutions may only have one large role to play over the entire recovery period, whereas others may have multiple, equally important responsibilities,” he said, noting that diversification must be approached by paying critical attention to priority areas which allows for alignment and coordination in the local ecosystem.

Among other policy initiative implications, the experts also supported diversification within the financial industry which they believe could be targeted through product and service innovations and also through greater financial inclusion of the society.

The financial inclusion solutions, they, however, said should include improvements to the social safety net, major labour market reforms and other policy actions needed for improved productivity.

Director of the PIOJ’s Growth Inducement Programme, Laura Levy, concluded that deliberate effort was also needed to increase digital literacy in the population to drive future innovators.

“Human capital and technological investments layered on to continued sound fiscal policy implementation and legislative updates will lead to a more competitive and diverse business environment in Jamaica and therefore an economy that is more resilient and robust,” she said.