Mrs. Tamira La Cruz - Owner MarkStra Caribbean 

Tamira La Cruz, MBA, is the owner of MarkStra Caribbean and is mostly known as a marketing specialist. However, she is a micro-economist with an MBA degree from the Wharton Business School at the University of Pennsylvania.

Over the past few years she has concentrated on issues of competitiveness, innovation and private sector development and conducted, on own account, the World Economic Forum’s Global Competitiveness Study.

The presentation seeks to create awareness of the factors that are now seen by the global community to determine the competitiveness of nations, their firms, value chains and business clusters and how Curaçao can become a better partner for trade, investment and collaboration for countries in the region.

How come very large, low cost countries like China, India and Indonesia, known for their high work ethic, do not rank high on the Global Competitiveness Index, while relatively small, high wage, high tax countries such as Switzerland and Sweden do?

There are several interpretations of what ‘Competitiveness’ is. What indicators do policy makers, countries and firms de facto agree on as the most important indicators for global competitiveness and ability to attract investments and export nowadays?

The presentation will address the findings of the Global Competitiveness Index Study for the island of Curaçao and will provide insight on the 30-35 areas that contribute to the competitiveness of a company and/or sector. The following topics, amongst others, will be discussed:

-  Definition of the Global Competitiveness Index and the term ‘Productivity’

- The strengths and weaknesses of Curaçao and how Curaçao compares with other countries; and,

- The role of the International Financial Services Sector in improving the Competitiveness Index of Curaçao