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7
Capacity Building Approaches for BSOs
in Trade and Investment
Under the 10th EDF, the capacity building of BSOs involves
strengthening the quality, and widening the range of
programmes in the area of trade and investment for support
organisations. This definition puts emphasis on three things:
identifying the BSOs within the region that play a significant
trade support function; the importance of building institutional
or organisational capacity of BSOs, including national TPOs, as
well as private sector membership trade support institutions
(TSIs); and activities focused on improving the effectiveness
of the work of the BSOs. These also underscore the need for
Caribbean Export to develop or strengthen its competency to
deliver, or to facilitate provision of capacity building activities
and interventions.
Caribbean Export utilises a wide range of interventions to
enhance the capabilities of BSOs including training, networking,
meetings and workshops, missions, and support for activities and
programmes. The approach employed is therefore determined
by the objectives of the Agency, and based on identified needs
of the private sector.
Assessment Of Trade Support Institutions
To ensure that BSOs make optimum use of the opportunities
provided by Caribbean Export under the 10th EDF, it was
necessary to undertake interventions aimed at improving their
institutional and organisational capacities. Specifically, the
Agency’s work focused on the assessment of the mandates, and
functions of BSOs across the region to determine the extent to
which they perform trade support functions. For the national
TPOs, the Agency focused on benchmarking their operations and
functions, utilising themethodology and tool of the International
Trade Centre (ITC), Geneva.