The challenge for Kamla Persad Bissessar is that she cannot govern as if Trinidad and Tobago is still operating in the 1980s energy economy while the rest of the world is rapidly moving toward AI, automation, robotics and leaner production systems.
AI and technology will inevitably reduce the need for certain categories of labour, especially repetitive administrative and industrial work, so the country urgently needs new investment, foreign exchange, energy revenues and downstream industries to cushion that transition and create higher skilled employment.
That is why the Venezuela gas arrangements and the expanding ExxonMobil deepwater projects are strategically critical, not just for oil and gas, but for preserving foreign exchange earnings, sustaining government revenues, funding social programmes, supporting manufacturing and buying time for Trinidad and Tobago to modernise its economy and retrain its workforce for a more technology driven future.
Without strong energy revenues during this transition period, the country could face the dangerous combination of declining jobs, weak FX inflows and rising social instability.
Gordon Laughlin,
Westmoorings
