The Tribune

AN ARRAY of speakers yesterday took the stage at the RF Business Outlook event.

It is a successful event held at Baha Mar – The Tribune is one of the supporters – but what is most notable is that it aims to cover a host of topics, bringing the global issues to our doorstep.

Those global issues have been on our doorstep for a long time. They feel more pressing than ever given some of the items in the news lately.

One of the speakers was a former deputy national security advisor under US President Donald Trump in his first tenure.

Her topic veered toward the tariffs that are prompting so many headlines and so much economic concern around the world.

She talked of how Trump is using the “leverage” of the US being the world’s largest trading market “and he’s using that”.

She talked of how “no presidents have really exploited that before, but Donald Trump is going to use it”.

This comes at a time when the US is using another form of leverage – pressuring senior officials by putting their visas at risk because of Cuban workers having been brought to our country.

Prime Minister Philip Davis yesterday denied the suggestions that the workers here in The Bahamas are “forced labour”.

Mr Davis said: “This government will never and don’t intend to engage in any forced labour. It is our law and we are a country of laws, but we have indicated that we don’t think that we have done it, we will review where we are and get back to them in due course.”

Foreign Minister Fred Mitchell also insisted that “The Bahamas believes that it follows all international best practices in the recruitment of labour”.

Part of the focus of the event yesterday was on helping businesspeople navigate this landscape of uncertain and changing times internationally, so the issues at the forefront of the news are timely – if troublesome.

What is clear however is that such discussions matter.

The on again-off again tariffs being applied by the US government are causing turbulence economically.

Businesses thrive on stability. A company wants to know, for example, if it makes a decision now to launch a product or to take on staff what the financial costs are likely to be on supplies, that inflation is not likely to spike and so on. Knowing the costs it faces to do business is crucial for a company to know whether the investment is a good idea – or whether it might backfire expensively.

This is the whirlwind world we are operating in – but in the middle of it, we have one another to rely on, one another to listen to, to gain advice from.

If there is one lesson from the changes around us that we should learn, it is that we need to stand on our own feet as much as possible. Together as a nation.

Depending on others leaves us stranded when others cannot be depended on.

For all our sakes, we should be prepared for this changing world as best as possible.