Most businesses find environment very accommodating, positive
– 90% of respondents believe Government’s attitude toward business ‘very supportive’
A SURVEY, carried out by the Georgetown Chamber of Commerce and Industry (GCCI), revealed that most of its members find the current business environment very accommodating and positive. Most of those surveyed reported a break-even or profitable position in 2011, as well as positive outlook for 2012, GCCI President, Mr. Clinton Urling told a media briefing yesterday.
He added that the greater number of those who responded to the questionnaire feel that the value added tax (VAT) is too high and should be pegged at a rate of between 10 and 12 percent.
The GCCI investigation, called the 2012 Chamber Attitudinal Survey, was the first of its kind to be conducted by the organisation, Urling disclosed.
He said 57 respondents answered questions related to performance indicators, costs of operations, outlook on the national economy, obstacles to success, access to finance, opinions on VAT and Government support.
With respect to the national economy, 70 percent of those who responded said they were positive and optimistic about the economy in 2012.
Twenty-six percent said they expect economic conditions to remain unchanged while four percent offered no opinion, Urling revealed.

SUCCESSFUL
According to him, about access to finance, 96 percent of the businesses, which sought to secure financing in 2011, were successful.
Nine percent of the respondents believe that Government’s attitude toward business was very supportive while 51 percent are of the view that the support was moderate.
The investigation determined that a little less than one-third or 32 percent characterised the Government’s thinking as neutral and fewer than nine percent feel the Government approach to business is “moderately unsupportive.” None said it is “very unsupportive.”
Urling said the main aims of the analysis were:
* to gauge members’ intentions, needs, concerns and the obstacles to fulfilling their performance potential;
* to act as an effective, relevant and well articulated sounding board for possible Government interactions and relationship building initiatives to assist Chamber members and the wider Private Sector and
* to create a database for use in  follow-up studies amongst the Private Sector, which, eventually will provide effective longitudinal measures and inform the Chamber about business and economic issues that are timely and warrant pro-active advocacy on the part of the Private Sector and the Chamber’s membership.
The exercise will be conducted annually with the same objectives, Urling announced.