By the time this article appears Jamaica’s Prime Minister Dr Andrew Holness will have outlined his vision for Jamaica’s recovery at the opening night of the annual Jamaica Stock Exchange conference. This article argues that completing the alternative investment ecosystem, particularly in the areas of infrastructure and venture capital, is critical to Jamaica’s recovery.

For pension funds, the current 5 per cent limit for private assets includes both private debt and private equity combined, and there is no separate carve out for real assets such as infrastructure. This is despite infrastructure being an ideal asset class for pension funds as it is typically less risky than equity investments and often has bond-type characteristics in terms of more guaranteed cash flows. Sharply increased investments in this area to combat climate change and improve our productivity will, therefore, be absolutely critical to Jamaica’s recovery. A very simple reform would be to allow 5 per cent to be invested in both the debt and equity asset class separately, plus a dedicated infrastructure bucket of between 5-10 per cent, perhaps rising over time.

Sanya Goffe, a leading pension lawyer at prominent law firm Hart Muirhead Fatta and head of the Pension Fund Association of Jamaica, agrees that infrastructure should be a separate asset class under the pension fund regulations.

She notes: “Increased longevity and escalating climate risks are reshaping the demands placed on pension systems and the way long-term capital must be deployed. Infrastructure investment enables pension funds to respond to both challenges by matching long-dated liabilities with real assets that generate predictable cash flows while supporting climate resilience and critical public services.

“To realise this potential at scale, our investment regulations should recognise infrastructure as a distinct asset class with a dedicated carve out and differentiated limits and conditions that reflect its unique risk profile, governance requirements, and long-term nature. Such an approach would preserve strong prudential oversight while allowing pension funds to contribute more effectively to sustainable economic development and long-term retirement security.”

An excellent example of the power of infrastructure investment is TransJamaican Highway Limited, which, as a toll road, was very successfully listed on the Jamaica Stock Exchange and is, therefore, able to be bought by pension funds as a listed equity. However, not all infrastructure investments will be listed, and the process was a very long one, so we need to move much faster. One of the best current examples for the transformative power of infrastructure investments is actually the Rio Cobre Water Project, as outlined below by Musson Vice-Chairman Nicholas Scott.

“Pan Jamaica Group and Eppley have formed an infrastructure investment platform company called Capital Infrastructure Group (CIG). CIG has in excess of US$20 million of equity and has already made two investments. The largest investment is as the controlling shareholder of Rio Cobre Water Company Limited (Rio Cobre). Rio Cobre is itself a joint venture with French multinational Vinci. Under a public-private partnership with the Government of Jamaica, Rio Cobre will build a 15-million gallon per day water treatment plant. This will be the second largest water treatment plant in Jamaica. Rio Cobre is now under construction and at completion will sell water to the National Water Commission under a long-term contract.”

Critically, the project was financed by IDB Invest, Proparco (a French Development Agency), and Sagicor. As Scott notes, the project shows that Jamaica can construct and finance critical infrastructure without absorbing fiscal space through the collaboration of local and international sources of capital.

Venture Capital

Another critical area is the need to dramatically expand our current venture capital ecosystem in which the issue of pipeline is critical, as well as update our legislation, which dates from the early 1980s.

The Nobellum Accelerator, under the leadership of Canada-based Jamaican Melissa Ellis, as part of the Catalyst for Entrepreneurship and Innovation (CEI) Global Project has begun work on that most fundamental prerequisite of venture capital, meaning identifying a robust, investable pipeline of companies.

Ellis observes: “Canadian accelerator Nobellum Enterprise addresses this gap by strengthening the investment pipeline and institutional readiness of founders. This approach was piloted through the 2025 CEI Jamaica project, delivered in partnership with Nobellum, the Development Bank of Jamaica (DBJ), and Jamaica’s Technology & Digital Alliance (JTDA), formerly the Jamaica Computer Society (JCS), which together supported eight high-potential Jamaican businesses, each generating over US$100,000 in annual revenue.

“The companies received training to become investor-ready through targeted fractional advisory services focused on governance, financial management, and scalable business models. Research indicates that over 70 per cent of small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) in emerging markets fail to access formal financing due to weak financial structures and governance, underscoring the urgency of such interventions.”

She adds: “Leveraging its global investor network, Nobellum mobilised Canadian fund managers to Jamaica to directly engage the local innovation ecosystem, convening 35 ecosystem builders across finance, policy, and entrepreneurship. The delegation included senior leaders from the Export Development Bank of Canada and the African Union, alongside fund managers from BKR Capital, Real Venture, the Black Opportunity Fund, and the Firehood Angel Network, collectively overseeing $550 million in deployable capital.

“These investors provided direct, hands-on training to the founder cohort, an experience entrepreneurs rarely access, creating real-time feedback loops between capital providers and business owners. This engagement highlighted a critical systemic gap: founders require earlier and more frequent exposure to capital pathways to build trust, refine their business models, and align with market expectations.”

The project confirmed that although alternative capital financing is needed, ecosystem coordination and capital readiness are key to transitioning thousands of Jamaican small and medium-sized enterprises into investable businesses. Venture capital investments, perhaps with some de-risking, could also be part of the private equity bucket for pension funds.

The plan should be to scale up the DBJ’s angel programme pilot, working along with foreign accelerators based in the metropoles in the US, UK, and Canada (such as Nobellum Enterprise). The goal should be to specifically target the Caribbean (not just Jamaican) Diaspora and thereby treat it as part of a virtual Caribbean Sea.

Critical business environment reforms must be part of this agenda as one cannot pour capital, or metaphorical water, onto the sand of a poor business environment. The acceleration of the reform of the business environment will no doubt be part of the prime minister’s stock exchange speech.

Dr Andrew Holness (Photo: JIS)

Keith Collister