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REQUEST FOR EXPRESSIONS OF INTEREST
(CONSULTING SERVICES – INDIVIDUAL SELECTION)
OECS MSME Guarantee Facility Project
Loan No.: IDA-62670, IDA-62660, IDA-62640, IBRD-88830, IDA-62650
Assignment Title: Senior Operating Officer (SOO)
Reference No. KN-ECPCGC-207852-CS-INDV
The Governments of Antigua and Barbuda, Commonwealth of Dominica, Grenada, St. Lucia and St. Vincent and the Grenadines have received financing in the amount of US$10 million equivalent from the World Bank towards the cost of establishing a partial credit guarantee scheme, and they intend to apply part of the proceeds to payments for goods, and consulting services to be procured under this project.
The consultant will serve as the “Senior Operating Officer (SOO)” for the ECPCGC and should possess Extensive knowledge of MSME lending with some direct experience lending to small and medium-sized businesses, knowledge of the internal controls necessary for a lending operation and the ability to design and implement risk management procedures. The ideal candidate should possess an Undergraduate Degree from a reputable college or university, preferably in Business, Accounting, or related field; and a minimum of 5 years’ experience in MSME lending in a financial services institution. The initial contracted employment period will be for two years subject to a performance review and an expression of further contracted employment three months before the expiration of the existing contract. The assignment is expected to begin on April 15, 2021.
The consultant will report directly to the Chief Executive Officer of the ECPCGC and the ECPCGC Board of Directors.
The detailed Terms of Reference (TOR) for the assignment can be viewed by following the attached link below.
https://tinyurl.com/yygezdt9
The Eastern Caribbean Partial Credit Guarantee Corporation (ECPCGC) now invites eligible “Consultants” to indicate their interest in providing the Services. Interested Consultants should provide information demonstrating that they have:
- An Undergraduate Degree from a reputable college or university, preferably in Business, Accounting, or related field; and
- Minimum of 5 years’ experience in MSME lending in a financial services institution.
Applicants should also have:
- Extensive knowledge of MSME lending with some direct experience lending to small and medium-sized businesses
- Extensive knowledge of MSME banking operations
- Knowledge of the internal controls necessary for a lending operation and the ability to design and implement risk management procedures
- Experience developing and presenting information in public, including responding to questions in real-time
- Experience lending to MSMEs located in the ECCU
- Ability to draft procedures to be used in a lending operation
- Familiarity with the mechanics of a loan guarantee program
- Exceptional written, oral, interpersonal, and presentation skills, and
- Proficiency in the use of Microsoft Office software.
The attention of interested Individual Consultants is drawn to Section III, Paragraphs 3.14, 3.16, and 3.17 of the World Bank’s Procurement Regulations for IPF Borrowers July 2016, [revised November 2017] (“Procurement Regulations”), setting forth the World Bank’s policy on conflict of interest.
A Consultant will be selected in accordance with the Approved Selection Method for Individual Consultants set out in the clause 7.34 of the World Bank Procurement Regulations for IPF Borrowers.
Further information can be obtained at the address below during office hours 0800 to 1700 hours.
Expressions of interest must be delivered in a written form by e-mail by February 16, 2021 to [email protected]
Eastern Caribbean Partial Credit Guarantee Corporation
Brid Rock, Basseterre,
St. Kitts.
For further information, please contact:
Carmen Gomez-Trigg Bernard Thomas
Chief Executive Officer Chief Financial Officer
Tel: 868-620-8144 Tel: 869-765-2385
Email: [email protected] [email protected]
6 responses to “Antigua spending $500,000 a month to keep LIAT flying”
Well, LIAT is going to have to rebuild it’s market share. It was good news recently to learn that LIAT is flying regularly to the British Virgin Islands again.
In order for LIAT to operate successfully like a private sector entity, it must have the right financial structure: in particular, LIAT must minimize lease and rent expenses. You must stop paying office rent by taking out a bank loan and buy your own Office Building without much further delay. In due course, you can start buying even a few of your planes – even one (1) at a time -, but this is not as urgent as owning real estate, which you can give to the bank as collateral to finance, for example, periodical bank overdrafts.
If the $ 500,000 per month in Government subsidy is spent mostly on salaries and wages for LIAT’s local workers, that’s not so bad. Because the salaries and wages paid out are likely, for the most part, to be spent back in the local economy.
LIAT should continue to strive to regain its market share, in the hope that it will soon be able to rehire all, or most, of its pilots and other workers displaced by its recent ‘lockdown’ during the pandemic. But, once again, LIAT must quickly improve on its financial structure by reducing leases and rentals, and by acquiring real estate – ie your own office building – that it can give to a bank as collateral security to meet its periodical – or seasonal – deficits in salaries and wages requirements.
The older folks always said that “rent is a killer”, and I have proven it to be true.
Waste ah money! mismatch posse still there! Role call double A, GOOGLE, COVID wife and I-Weave. Doan forget the trini lawyer got her free masters for a bad ATR deal and went south to work against it. I have an idea use the money to pay the employees that been working for months without pay or pay the ones who waiting for their severance. Better yet pay for the active 40+ lawsuits from ill treated employees. Because at the end of the day that loan has to be paid back to Venezuela.
E Marley
I think your view is short sighted. Our country’s economy needs an operational LIAT. In particular, the Government needs to create regular employment for all those LIAT pilots and other workers made redundant during the COVID-19 lockdown. An operational LIAT will contribute significantly to our country’s GDP.
LIAT has already started making inroads back into the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) and Barbados markets. Beyond that, all it needs to do to be successful is to create a good financial structure and properly streamline its operation. A good financial structure would include having its own office building, so that it can reduce rental and lease expenses and give collateral to the bank to support needed bank loans and overdrafts etc. The rest of a good financial structure would simply refer to having a feasible Business Plan.
Clearly, LIAT is not out of the woods as yet, especially because Barbados has gone into lockdown again. In the short run, especially, LIAT will need to avoid trying to serve an oversized market. For example, It probably should not go beyond Trinidad and Tobago in the south nor beyond the Virgin Islands, or maybe Puerto Rico in the north.
LIAT could actually have a bright future. I think that once it has an adequate market share within the foreseeable future, it will just need to have a good Financial Structure, a feasible Business Plan and some support from regional Governments in terms of the level of Governments’ Ticket Taxes and Landing Fees Etc.
Roy your points are great, but it cannot happen with the same management and political interference. Maybe you should apply! One correction you say “ in the short run, especially, LIAT will need to avoid trying to serve an oversized market.” My brother unless you have been living under a rock for the past year or so it is the exact opposite of that. Nobody nar travel. The pandemic is protracted. The same money is being wasted flying an undersized market. Use the money to make right with employees and customers.
I did not live under a rock for the past year or so. By saying that LIAT should try to avoid serving an “oversized market”, I am not referring to the vibrancy of the market; I am referring to the geographical space covered. For example, I said that LIAT should not go farther south than Trinidad and Tobago, nor farther north than the British Virgin Island or, maybe, Puerto Rico.
I believe that in the past LIAT overextended itself by going as far as Guyana, and possibly Surinam in the south; and, in the north, they may have reached as far as Jamaica and the Dominican Republic. Looking at LIAT’s past performance through the eyes of an Accountant, Auditor, Business Planner and Economist, with over forty years experience, I can see that LIAT was always riddled with too many inefficiencies in its operations. There can be no doubt that the Marketing Staff worked extremely hard. But, its Central Financial Control Planners, including, perhaps, its CEOS, seemingly lacked appropriate Business Experience and never applied the kind of Rigid Management and Financial Controls that LIAT really required.
It would appear that LIAT operated very much on Automatic Pilot, and merely kept on “Blowing in the Wind”, without any preconceived destination. Let’s hope it will do better next time.
That’s a lot of money. It is always important to establish reserves. This idea of spending as though there is no tomorrow serves Caribbean people no good. We must put appropriate checks and balances in place to avoid certain disaster.