St. Lucia

St. Lucia adopted its Free Zone Act in 2004. In late 2005, Locus Economica CEO and Founder Jean-Paul Gauthier was invited, as a World Bank representative, to participate in a Commonwealth Secretariat workshop on “special economic zones, the WTO and fiscal incentives in CARICOM and the Eastern Caribbean States”, held in St. Lucia. In the context of his presentations and of the facilitating follow-on working groups on country-level solutions for the participating nations, he led a rapid assessment exercise of St. Lucia’s free zone regime on these fronts, which formed the basis for a number of recommended reforms. St. Lucia thereafter amended its Free Zone Act in 2006. Since then, an operational free zone has been established in St. Lucia, located in Vieux Fort near the international airport and port, with 11 warehouses and 18 tenants. In 2016, the government announced its intention to establish 5 economic zones, including in order to make Castries (the capital) into an SEZ and regional business hub and to develop IT centers in Vieux Fort, making it into a knowledge zone