Artisans from the Caribbean will showcase their products in Santo Domingo at an event designed to expose their companies to international markets. The Design Caribbean trade show, which will be held September 1 – 4, 2011, is the culmination of a project of the International Trade Centre and Caribbean Export which aims, among others, at boosting the skills and market access for targeted sub-sectors of the CARIFORUM Creative Industries. The project is funded by the European Union.
The ITC project has enabled artisans to better understand export markets and deal with international buyers whom they will encounter when they exhibit their products at the Design Caribbean show. Nearly 100 regional artisans and industry experts have participated in workshops related to the project in the Dominican Republic, Haiti, Trinidad and Tobago, Barbados, and Jamaica.
The two-day Export Marketing workshops, which took place in the five Caribbean countries during the first three weeks of August, exposed participants to tools for assessing their export readiness and responding to the full business development cycle. The participants learned the importance of defining and marketing their unique brand identity and were introduced to methodologies for choosing and developing the right products for export and for calculating and setting export market prices. The artisans in attendance indicated that the training was very useful in helping them prepare for the upcoming Design Caribbean trade show and considerably helped to highlight the missing links in their export strategies.
‘Knowledge of market trends and how global value chains operate are required to enter and compete in export markets,’ said ITC senior trade promotion officer and project manager Jeanette Sutherland. ‘The export marketing workshops therefore provided a useful complement to the product design trainings producers received earlier in the year, which were also supported by the project.’
Buyers from North America, Europe, and the Caribbean will attend the Design Caribbean trade show.
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