CONTRIBUTED -
Chairman of the Hardware Merchants Association (HMA), Michael D. Brooks (right), meets with Errol Salkey (left), managing director of Alumina de Caribe and Howard Chin of Brumalia Hardware. The occasion was the HMA's annual general meeting held recently at the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel.
HARDWARE MERCHANTS need to be prepared in order to be able to compete effectively under the imminent Caribbean Single Market Economy (CSME) regime, according to the Hardware Merchants' Association (HMA) Chairman, Michael D. Brooks.
"We have to get our houses in order," the chairman stated at the post annual general meeting luncheon held recently at the Jamaica Pegasus. He urged the membership to face the upcoming competition by encouraging them to institute measures to increase efficiency as the only way to compete with goods moving within the CSME borderless region.
IMPORTANT FACET
While outlining methods to streamline operations, he selected education as the single most important facet to developing the sort of efficiency necessary.
"To attain these efficiency
levels, we need an educated and trained workforce," he said. "The elements of any plan we come up with should rely heavily on education, education in general and education at the level of the work place to improve efficiencies."
Mr. Brooks further recounted to the membership a number of other areas of operations to be enhanced, in order to achieve readiness for the new system of trading. These include he said, improved customer service, utilising the latest systems of inventory control, use of technology to source goods at competitive prices, taking advantage of the transfer of technology, honing entrepreneurial skills to the highest levels and engaging in proper capitalisation of businesses.
COMMITTEE MEMBERS
Eighteen managing committee members were elected by the HMA membership for the 2004 - 2005 period at the business session. They are: Richard Anderson, Anderson Hardware; Howard Chin, Brumalia Hardware; Errol Salkey, Alumina De Caribe; Richard Crichton, Crichton Bros.; Gary Ferguson, Carib Cement; Ann Arthur, Eurostyle; Keith Reese, Hal's Hardware; Roy Holness, Handy Hardware; Ian Jackson, Hardware & Lumber; Michael Brooks, Home Central; Rocky Shields, Island Hardware; Fay Swaby, Jamaica Livestock; Hopeton Findlay, KS Chemical; Hanif Persad, Persad's Hardware; Marlene Myrie-Porter, Mainland; Kirmit Rose, Rose Bros.; Norma Sinclair, Sinclair's Hardware & Farm Supplies and Hopeton Halliman, Tankweld Metals.
