USAID Caribbean Business Enabling Environment Reform Activity (CBEE-R)

The objective of CBEE-R is to enhance the business enabling environment (BEE) in the Caribbean region, which will lead to more robust and resilient businesses and unlock investment opportunities to stimulate economic growth. The program will accomplish this goal by improving BEE in various ways, including facilitating better access to electricity for businesses, providing more dependable and affordable internet connectivity to promote an inclusive, secure digital economy, establishing a more favorable business environment for accessing digital financial services, and streamlining regulatory compliance to facilitate easier access to finance. Furthermore, CBEE-R will encourage meaningful and effective public-private dialogue.

An essential element of CBEE-R’s implementation involves enhancing the capabilities of the public and private sectors in the Caribbean to undertake critical BEE reforms by providing specialized training, technical support, and grants. The program aims to bolster the capacity to establish a robust and meaningful Public-Private Dialogue (PPD) where the private sector’s concerns are acknowledged and addressed by policymakers in the public sector. CBEE-R will offer comprehensive grant programs to support capacity building and grantees during the grant application, co-creation process, and implementation stages.

CBEE-R seeks to enhance financial services and empower businesses in the Caribbean by facilitating their access to necessary financial resources to promote growth and expansion. The program also aims to boost digital financial services by providing training and capacity building in digital financial literacy and developing appropriate legal and regulatory frameworks to enable access to such services.

CBEE-R aims to bolster digitalization efforts and e-government initiatives to align with international best practices to strengthen the government’s ability to implement business environment reforms. This will facilitate and support the private sector and citizens in utilizing these services.

CBEE-R prioritizes gender and social inclusion (GESI) considerations in all its activities and technical assistance. For instance, the program provides adequate childcare support during training activities to ensure the participation of women with young children. Moreover, since most women-owned businesses in the region are micro, small, and medium enterprises (MSMEs), CBEE-R’s activities that target improving access to finance for firms will disproportionately benefit women entrepreneurs.