Deloitte is the youngest of the ‘big four’ in Trinidad and Tobago; what was the impetus behind entering the market?

Deloitte Trinidad began operating in early 2009 and has grown from a firm of four partners and 35 staff to six partners and nearly 100 staff. Deloitte Canada has just acquired a geological consultancy firm called AJM Petroleum Consultants, which they have rebranded as AJM Deloitte. We are looking at establishing a branch in Trinidad and Tobago to service the Caribbean cluster as well as South America. Although we are the youngest of the ‘big four,’ we have seen tremendous growth and remain confident in our growth potential here. Deloitte Trinidad is currently not seen as a player in the oil and gas consulting or advisory space, but we are hopeful that we will be able to carve out a niche for ourselves with the establishment of AJM Deloitte here.

spc9

How do you find the operating environment for companies in Trinidad and Tobago?

The operating environment in Trinidad and Tobago is definitely an issue. We ranked quite poorly in the World Bank’s ‘Ease of Doing Business’ survey and need to fix that. The corruption perception needs to be corrected and a change in cultural mindset needs to occur to invite renewed investment in the country.

What needs to be done to improve Trinidad and Tobago’s ranking in the World Bank’s ‘Ease of Doing Business’ survey?

One of the biggest stumbling blocks for doing business here is the lack of automation and computerization; far too much paperwork still has to be completed on actual paper instead of digitally. The public sector as a whole needs a boost in its training and work ethic. Before we can push local content laws on foreign companies, we need to ensure that our local content undergoes a transformation that makes it competitive on a more global scale. We do have a very skilled workforce in the energy sector, but poor investment has slowed down the development of Trinidad and Tobago into a first world country.

It is a common complaint in the sector that access to finance is very difficult to come by locally. Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) accounts for a great deal of financing in the energy sector because, despite being liquid, banks are not willing to support the industry. Why is that?

Trinidad and Tobago is a very closed society that functions in large part on relationships. Banks are not willing to provide reasonable rates to projects and people they are not familiar with. As a result, many of the smaller players that could propel the country and sector forward have a difficult time breaking into this circle. The entire mindset needs to change and become more open before local banks would be willing to support the industry. Once that happens, local investment may surpass FDI.

Where do you hope to see the firm in a few years’ time and how indicative would this be of the industry’s potential?

We are placing a strong focus on getting AJM Deloitte established in the country, which will improve our perception in the oil and gas industry while adding to our staff and capabilities. Energy should become our number one priority in the next year and we hope to expand our team to include senior geologists and reservoir engineers. Essentially, we are working on driving our energy practice forward. This outlook is indicative of our thoughts on the industry’s potential; there are some hurdles to its development and these do need to be overcome, but we are confident that this will happen. The government has been working towards improving the framework surrounding the energy sector for the past two years and we believe that this will become more apparent in the coming year.