By Ayanna Kirton, Staff Reporter DEHRING BUNTING & Golding (DB&G), ValuCard, Starapples, and the Bank of Nova Scotia (BNS) were recognised by the Private Sector Organisation of Jamaica for their contribution to employment at the monthly Job Creation Awards held on Tuesday at the Terra Nova All Suite Hotel, St. Andrew.
Both Starapples and ValuCard received Small Business awards for creating a minimum of five additional jobs while DB&G was honoured for its creation of 25 new employment opportunities. In business for over 115 years, BNS was acknowledged for creating employment in Jamaica for a period surpassing 70 years.
Starapples opened for business three years ago and has built a reputation for serving great Jamaican food in causally elegant surroundings. The restaurant has two locations in St. Andrew and employs a total of 26 persons. ValuCard specialises in the design and management of store value software for the Jamaican and Caribbean market. The company has combined Internet technology with Point of Sale stored value applications to develop products for retailers that are designed to increase sales and profitability. The Texaco ValuCard, a prepaid/ credit card is the first of a series of stored value products launched by the company.
DB&G, one of Jamaica's most extensive financial service providers, offers investors an alternative to the traditional commercial and merchant banking services. The company operates a cambio, merchant bank, unit trust and stockbrokerage firm. In addition, DB&G is a licensed securities dealer and authorised primary dealer. The Scotiabank Jamaica Group of Companies comprises Scotiabank, Scotia Jamaica Investment Management, Scotia Jamaica Building Society, Scotia Jamaica General Insurance Brokers and Scotia Jamaica Life Insurance Company. BNS has become an integral part of the local financial services sector since it began operations in Jamaica. In 2003 Scotiabank delivered its most outstanding year on record exceeding all performance targets achieving consolidated net profits of $5.4 billion, a 41 per cent increase compared with the previous year.
CREATE EMPLOYMENT
Speaking at the breakfast ceremony, Hon. Maxine Henry-Wilson, Minister of Education, Youth and Culture urged the award recipients to continue
to create employment and outlined various initiatives the Government had undertaken and planned to embark upon in the near future to improve the country's education system with an aim to create employable persons. According to the Minister, these initiatives would involve a transformation of the most fundamental levels of the curricula, beginning at the early childhood stage to foster a change in the approach to learning from an early age. Improvements in the numeracy and literacy levels among students entering secondary school was also critical, Mrs. Henry-Wilson said as this would help to address the poor levels of performance in CXC examinations, lack of problem solving capability, under preparation and the overall desire to learn among students. The Minister also indicated that the drive to engender the entrepreneurial spirit among students, encouraging them to create their own opportunities and to pursue non -traditional career paths were high on the Ministry's list of priorities.
