Jamaican beauty industry generates US$250 million annually – Minister Aubyn Hill 

Minister of Industry, Investment and Commerce, Senator Aubyn Hill Photo: Contributed

Speaking at the Christmas in July event held at the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel in Kingston, Minister of Industry, Investment and Commerce, Senator Aubyn Hill, called on Jamaican companies to, rather than create demand, meet demand at scale

Below is his full address: 

I am pleased to be here as the Minister of Industry, Investment and Commerce, Jamaica’s Business Ministry, for the 12th staging of Christmas in July 2026.

This initiative, led by the Tourism Linkages Network with partners including the Jamaica Business Development Corporation (JBDC), the Jamaica Manufacturers’ and Exporters’ Association (JMEA), the Jamaica Promotions Corporation (JAMPRO), and the Jamaica Hotel and Tourist Association (JHTA), connects local producers of gift and souvenir items with new markets. I commend JBDC and JAMPRO for strengthening this platform.

When a hotel group in Montego Bay, a corporate office in Kingston, or a buyer in Toronto needs a gift, a product line, or a service, where should their mind go first?

My answer is simple. It should come from Jamaica. Christmas in July was never meant to be just a craft fair.

Walk this floor this morning, and you will find fashion and accessories; honey, jams and preserves; aromatherapy, desktop solutions and corporate gift lines. That range is the whole point. It tells us Jamaican enterprise is not one industry looking for a market. It is dozens of industries, already built, already selling, and already touching agriculture, manufacturing, finance, tourism and technology at once.

This is serious business, and I want you to think of it that way from this morning forward.

Consider Jamaica’s beauty and personal care industry, which is projected to generate approximately US$250 million annually, supported by globally recognised Jamaican ingredients such as black castor oil, coconut-based products and botanical extracts.

With McKinsey projecting the global beauty market to approach US$600 billion by 2030, the opportunity before Jamaican entrepreneurs is enormous.

 That is a lane wide enough for a hundred Jamaican companies to grow into international brands, and beauty is just one aisle of this show. The same logic holds for our honey producers, our bedding and textile makers, jewellers, publishers, and financial service innovators. Different products, same opportunity. 

Jamaica does not need to invent demand. We need to meet the demand that already exists, at scale.

That is the strategic shift I am asking you to make this morning. Stop asking, “How do I sell more in Jamaica?” and start asking, “What does a buyer in Bogotá, Lagos, Nairobi, Singapore or Miami actually need, and can I be the one who supplies it?” 

That is a completely different posture. It requires market intelligence, not just production.

JAMPRO and our trade missions have already scoped Latin America and the Caribbean, Asia, Europe and North America. Use them. Go to the agencies, ask what specific gaps exist in those markets, and build toward filling them, rather than hoping the world discovers you by accident. Countries that have successfully expanded their exports studied their buyers, built competitiveness and positioned themselves deliberately.

Jamaica’s advantage is that our identity is already globally desired. What we now need is the discipline to convert that goodwill into repeatable export contracts, corporate accounts, and long-term buyer relationships for goods and, just as importantly, for high-value services like design, consulting, financial services, wellness and digital services that travel just as easily as a bottle of honey.

None of that happens without formalising. Register your business with the Companies Office of Jamaica. Speak to the Jamaica Intellectual Property Office about protecting your brand and your innovations through patents, trademarks and copyright. Digitise your systems.

Test and certify through the Bureau of Standards, Jamaica, so that when a buyer anywhere in the world asks whether your product meets international specifications, the answer is yes.

The Government is putting real instruments behind this shift, and I want to keep them at the front of mind. Through Productive Input Relief, qualifying MSMEs import raw materials, packaging and equipment free of duties that once reduced margin. That is capital kept for reinvestment.

Through our public procurement reforms, we are creating more opportunities for Jamaican businesses to supply the Government. The Public Procurement (Set-Asides) Order reserves 20 per cent of eligible procurement opportunities for MSMEs, while the Domestic Margin of Preference provides qualifying Jamaican suppliers with a 20 per cent advantage when competing against international bidders, where they demonstrate at least 35 per cent domestic content.

Also, get ready for the National Reconstruction and Resilience Authority (NaRRA). As reconstruction and resilience investment accelerates island-wide, local suppliers must be registered, certified and procurement-ready to participate at scale.

The Ministry of Industry, Investment and Commerce stands behind you with 20 agencies JBDC, JAMPRO, JIPO, COJ, BSJ, the Trade Board and others to help you brand, modernise, upskill your teams and professionalise your operations, so this is not a once-a-year trade show story. It is a permanent platform for growth.

The fuller conversation on export competitiveness, productivity and creative-sector development is bigger than one morning, and we will continue it. Let this Christmas in July be remembered as the moment that entrepreneurs stopped thinking small, started thinking global, and made Jamaica the address the world sources from.

Jamaica’s growth story will be written by entrepreneurs who are prepared to innovate, improve efficiency, create value and compete globally. A nation of empowered producers is a nation on the path to sustainable, shared prosperity, and that is the Jamaica we are building together.

Source: Our Today