Jun 2010 Financial News

Losses climb for Kingston business operators

Jun 02, 2010

As business returns to the downtown Kingston area following days of violence there, the losses from missed sales and property damage for operators in the shopping district continue to climb, with projections from the mainly medium to big-business umbrella group, the Jamaica Chamber of Commerce (JCC), reaching $600 million this week.

The financial sector is reporting little fallout from the unrest centred mainly in western Kingston, even as figures are yet to emerge to quantify the impact on scores of vendors and informal traders.

Milton Samuda, the JCC president, told Wednesday Business that a final figure has still not yet been arrived at as the JCC was still awaiting responses from its members.

"As the information comes in, I am now expecting significant losses in aggregate," said Samuda, who had given an early indication of losses in the region of $100 million last week.

"I think that it would be fair to say that it could pass $600 million, and climbing."

Omar Azan, president of the Jamaica Manufacturers' Association, said his business grouping was still in the process of collecting data from manufacturers.

"We not only had damage in terms of loss of sale but damage done to vehicles and infrastructure from bullet holes," he said.

"I know it is going to be substantial."

Jean Smith, general manager of the Jamaica Exporters Association, said members of that sector were affected but they have not been able to quantify the financial impact.

"I know members complained that they were not able to send off shipments, but right now we don't have an estimate," she said.

Some fresh-food producers said the impact was minimal and only affected productivity.

"We had no real monetary losses, just inconvenience," Richard McNair, company director of McNair Limited at Newport West, said.

He added that although the company lost one day of production, it has since then been able make up for the lost day.

Meanwhile, for the financial sector where many companies were forced to close centres in downtown Kingston during the height of the unrest, in which security forces battled gunmen at multiple locations, these entities are said to have suffered little financial impact as they were able to divert businesses to other branches.

"The impact of the recent civil unrest on NCB's (National Commercial Bank) business was primarily that of inconvenience to our customers as opening hours of the branches in the affected areas were modified to ensure the safety of both our staff and our customers," said Yvonne Clarke, group chief financial officer at the bank.

"From a preliminary assessment, the financial impact on our business is not expected to be significant as we were able to offer financial services from our other operating locations and through our electronic channels," she added.


Source:
dionne.rose@gleanerjm.com
Jamaica Gleaner
Wednesday June 2, 2010

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