BELTRAIDE Prepares for Caye Caulker MSME Road Show and Buy Belize Expo

The Belize Trade and Investment Development service BELTRAIDE, says that it is just about halfway through its ongoing road show for Micro, Small, and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs). The National MSME Road Show is headed to Caye Caulker on Thursday, for two days of discussions and information sharing, followed by the Buy Belize Expo on Saturday. Nikki Augustine, Marketing and Communications Manager for BELTRAIDE spoke on some of the information being shared with businesses attending the roadshow.

Nikki Augustine, Marketing and Communications Manager, BELTRAIDE: “This three day, and in some instance, two day event is geared towards assisting our MSMEs across the country. We have eleven stops in total so from Corozal all the way to Punta Gorda and this year we have integrated Benque Viejo and Hopkins. So these are new locations that we are hoping to hit and bring out more small businesses and support them in that area. So for the events that happen along the National MSME Road Show our first day is usually trainings. So we offer free trainings, marketing training, sales training , business development training so those are the trainings that we have for day one and then for the other day we have a formalization clinic. So a key purpose of the National MSME roadshow is to get our businesses formalized but not to scare people in terms of saying because people often think that when we talk about formalizing business it means taxing business and that is not necessarily true. We do have a lot of the agencies along the formalization process like if you need to learn about what Social Security does for small businesses they are there. We have BELIPO so the importance of trade marking your businesses and if you have a specific logo or so forth that’s very important to keep people from copying what you’re doing. But we of course have the tax department there but the tax department walks you through what type of taxes you would be paying and then if you’re also aware that right now you do have a program that helps small businesses where you don’t necessarily have to be paying the taxes for a couple years. So you can come on the road show and learn a little bit about these things.”

Augustine said that San Pedro is usually the last stop on the calendar, but BELTRAIDE decided to shake things up and held the San Pedro stop last weekend. She notes that the calendar will undergo some tweaking for next year, but outlined the road show’s remaining stops for this year.

Nikki Augustine, Marketing and Communications Manager, BELTRAIDE: “This week we have Caye Caulker Thursday and Friday that’s August 23rd and 24th in Caye Caulker. Following Caye Caulker we have Belmopan. So it’s three days in Belmopan from the 29th to the 31st and on the final day for each national MSME road show stop we have the Buy Belizean Expo. So this is free participation for these MSMEs that are participating to come out and display and sell. So for Belmopan stop we’re teaming up for a night market event. So that’s one of the things that we’re doing differently this year in Belmopan. And a new stop for us is Hopkins for following Belmopan we go to Hopkins. We know it’s a big tourist community and there’s a lot of entrepreneurship that ish happening there. So we go to Hopkins on the 13th and 14th and following that one of our biggest stops is San Ignacio / Santa Elena from September 26th to 28th and then we have Dangriga October 10th to 12. Placencia October 18th to 19th and as I mentioned before we close off in Belize City October 24 to 26th. This year is also the anniversary event for Belize City so we’re expecting a huge turnout for that. Businesses that participate are also allowed to participate in the expo across the country so we’re not discouraging if you live in Corozal and you want to participate in the expo in Hopkins you’re free to do so.”

Following the close of the National MSME Road Show, BELTRAIDE will host the 7th Entrepreneurship Conference (ENTRECON).