The African Export-Import Bank (Afreximbank) is to contribute $7 million (US$3.5m) to a “soon-to-be-established” urban transformation fund aimed at improving the lives of City residents in the shadow of its planned $360m (US$180m) African trade centre at Jemmotts Lane, Prime Minister Mia Mottley disclosed on Monday.
At the ground-breaking ceremony for the trade centre, she also revealed that the developers behind the new Hyatt Centric Hotel will pay $2 million into the fund, bringing the total pledged so far to $9 million.
The fund is to support upgrades to housing, infrastructure and community services for residents living near major development projects in the capital.
“Urban transformation isn’t only about buildings, but that is where it must start,” Mottley said.
“The quality of housing, the quality of infrastructure, and above all else, working with the institutions of The City… the people must be pioneers in their own land.”
The prime minister said the government’s aim is to create a Bridgetown that is vibrant and inclusive—not only a centre for business and tourism but also a place where Barbadians live, work, worship and recreate.
“We are clear. The deal for a new Bridgetown must not only include [upgraded] facilities or Golden Square . . . we want to go down to where the people live,” she said.
“What The City has become over the last two decades has to stop. And what it must become again is a city full of life—for Bajans, for visitors, for business, for church, for recreation.”
Noting that the transformation of the capital is already underway, she highlighted recent upgrades to the market, the demolition of a derelict National Insurance building to make way for the Golden Square Freedom Park, and plans to refurbish the long-abandoned Old Treasury Building.
She also shared that a new headquarters for the Barbados Fire Service is also in the works.
The Hyatt Centric Hotel, which has faced delays, is now progressing with foundation work behind hoarding already visible along Pierhead.
The 237-room resort will be located on almost three acres of waterfront along Carlisle Bay’s Brownes Beach.
Mottley said development plans are also being finalised for two vacant lots between the Hyatt site and Pierhead.
Those projects, she added, will reflect the government’s planning requirement that all major developments in the area contribute meaningfully to community upliftment.
“Other buildings which are being built in this district must have planning gains that are anchored to improve the lives of ordinary citizens,” she said.
“Because this is why we are doing this.”
She also defended the administration’s pro-investment stance, arguing that economic growth and job creation depend on attracting responsible private capital.
“[The letter] I comes before J only in the alphabet, but jobs come as a result of I—investment,” she said.
“To those who want this country to have an unhealthy relationship with investment and jobs, you are now acting worse than those who settled us and wanted to condemn our people to be nothing other than the hewers of wood and the drawers of water.”
The Afreximbank trade centre will include a hotel, conference facility, banking services, office space, and retail and entertainment outlets.
It is expected to create 1 000 construction jobs and 300 permanent jobs to boost the island’s standing as a hub for trade and business in the Caribbean.
(SM)
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