An Education Needs Assessment of CARIFORUM Firms

Figure 2: % of business operations based in CARIFORUM States

Where is your business based?

13.5%

10.4%

10.4%

10.4%

9.8%

8.8%

8.4%

6.1%

4.9%

4.3%

4.3%

3.9%

2.0%

1.6%

0.8%

0.4%

Figure 3: % of businesses per number of employees

Please indicate the total number of persons employed at your business

56.2%

17.2%

10.7%

5.7%

5.5%

3.2% 2.0%

Fewer than 5 persons

5 to 10 persons

11 to 25 persons

26 to 50 persons

50 to 75 persons

76 to 100 persons

More than 100 persons

Survey respondents were mainly concentrated in traditional sectors such as agriculture and agro

processing (22.7%), manufacturing (18.7%) and wholesale and retail (9.9%), with a notable

number of responses also coming from the business and professional services sector (11.7%) and

the creative sector (10.6%) (see Figure 4). These results conform with overall sectoral trends

identified in the desk research, where national priorities for the most part revolve around traditional

sectors like agriculture and manufacturing as well as services given the dominance of services

based economies within the region. However, many of the newer sectoral focuses identified by

CARIFORUM states like FinTech, life sciences, and the blue and green economy were not well

represented among survey respondents (see Figure 4). The lack of representation from these

sectors could be due either to a limited number of firms in these spaces or the lack of membership

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