CPLP: New head of business confederation calls for development bank

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CPLP: New head of business confederation calls for development bank

7:00 CAT | 02 Dec 2022

FILE - "If we want to put a product developed in Angola into Cabo Verde, we do not have a direct shipping line to make that connection. In air transport, we cannot connect Cabo Verde, Guinea, Sao Tome, Angola and Mozambique via direct airlines, which means that people have to travel to Portugal to get to any of these destinations," the Cape Verdean businessman gave as an example. [File photo: Lusa]

The new president of the Business Confederation of the CPLP, Cabo Verdean businessman Marcos Rodrigues, identified on Wednesday the lack of a financial instrument, transport and training as the biggest obstacles to developing the Portuguese-language community.

Marcos Rodrigues, who was elected on Tuesday for a four-year term, said that the Community of Portuguese-language Countries (CPLP) “has to move from words to deeds and to what is most important” and that if there is a “tacit political understanding” between the CPLP member states, it is necessary to “move on to economic issues, which are what matters,” he told Lusa.

“A development bank is significant so that we can create opportunities for companies and, without this instrument, each country faces great difficulties,” he said.

Vocational training and higher education, direct air and sea links between CPLP countries – “which is one of the great vectors of development and continues to be one of the biggest problems to be solved” – and the economic and financial instrument dedicated to Lusophone companies are the vehicles to “give a new soul to the confederation and entrepreneurs” in the community, he said.

“If we want to put a product developed in Angola into Cabo Verde, we do not have a direct shipping line to make that connection. In air transport, we cannot connect Cabo Verde, Guinea, Sao Tome, Angola and Mozambique via direct airlines, which means that people have to travel to Portugal to get to any of these destinations,” he gave as an example.

“These are major bottlenecks that must be resolved in the short term because, without economic activity in the space, there really is no life in the CPLP,” the Cabo Verdean businessman added.

These constraints can only be resolved if the members of the CPLP “take on part of the responsibility, putting airlines from countries with more resources in partnerships with airlines from countries with fewer resources, to make connections viable,” suggested the current president of the Sotavento Chamber of Commerce and the Higher Council of Chambers of Commerce and Tourism of Cabo Verde.

“For example, TAAG has enormous potential and could help countries such as Sao Tome, Guinea and Cabo Verde; TAP also has that potential and already links Portugal with the other CPLP countries, but we lack inter-African states. We have to achieve this quickly in both sea and air transport,” he said, adding that without transport, the financial instrument and training and education, there were “no conditions to materialise the development of the CPLP”.

Source: Lusa