Bahamas Striping has secured $25 million from Sygnus Credit Investments to complete the road improvement project on the island of Exuma.
Allan Albury, Managing Director of Bahamas Striping told ZNS that they chose to do business with the international company because of the terms available among other things. He said, “in this instance we went with the international company because of the terms, the flexibility, and as the president alluded to, they did not, sort of, put a noose around us in terms of the stringent requirements, albeit there are requirements that have to be met. The greater challenge is that small and medium sized businesses have always had in The Bahamas is access to capital. And there are institutions that are cash laden locally, but they don’t take the risk on entrepreneurial spirit or the Bahamian drive.”
The Exuma Road Improvement Project is estimated to cost $60 million and is a public private partnership between the Government and Bahamas Striping. Albury says, “the key element of this 3P is the level of, not just the employment, but the empowerment and so naturally there are scores of persons that are employed on the project directly, but beyond that, we’ve earmarked in excess of $10 million that will trickle down into local contracts or contracts for local service providers.”
For his part, Bahamas Striping President, Atario Mitchell says, “the end result is Exuma is going to have forty five miles of asphalt paved roads, that’s the main highway as well as some side roads. What we are pushing to do now is, we have a schedule before we close for the Christmas, we’re pushing to have twelves miles of road paved within this new 3P project.”
The project is expected to be completed in 2024.
