St Lucia among top 10 in Global citizenship programme index

CASTRIES, St Lucia Oct. 25 CMC – St. Lucia has secured ninth position globally and fourth regionally in the recently released Henley & Partners Global Citizenship Programme Index (GCPI).
The annual report, now in its fourth edition, provides a systematic analysis and comprehensive benchmarking of the world’s most important investment migration programmes and has become the industry gold standard for this type of evaluation.
The 12 countries included in the GCPI were evaluated according to 10 indicators: Reputation, Quality of Life, Visa-Free or Visa-on-Arrival Access, Processing Time and Quality of Processing, Compliance, Investment Requirements, Residence Requirements, Relocation Flexibility, Physical Visit Requirements, and Transparency. Each indicator had an equal weighting of 10, producing a total score out of 100 for each country.
“ The recent findings set Saint Lucia apart globally, as a destination of high standards and ease of doing business. This achievement is encouraging both for investors and the people of Saint Lucia, who will ultimately benefit from potential investments. We must continue to develop our product to improve our ranking and investor potential,” said Mark Maragh, Managing Director of Henley & Partners St Lucia.
The programmes were evaluated by a panel of independent experts — including immigration and citizenship lawyers, economists, sovereign risk experts, and academic researchers — who took into account a broad range of factors pertaining to each programme.
The result is a global bird’s-eye view of the investment migration industry and a ranking of all the major programmes on offer in both the residence and the citizenship sector.
“The Global Residence and Citizenship Programmes publication is an invaluable tool for all those interested in alternative residence or citizenship as well as for the professionals who advise them, including private client advisors, private bankers, and lawyers. It also provides governments operating investment migration programmes with a detailed picture of the broader industry landscape and of where they fit within it,” said Dr. Christian H. Kälin, an international immigration and citizenship law expert and Group Chairman of Henley & Partners,
Meanwhile, St. Kitts and Nevis and Grenada slid slightly down the ranking as a result of these new entries, but they maintained strong scores of 61.
According to Dr. Kälin, the need for a reference and benchmarking tool such as the Global Residence and Citizenship Programmes report is more pressing than ever, as the investment migration industry continues to grow at a rapid pace.
“Demand for such programmes is at an all-time high,” explains Dr. Kälin, “and new programmes are being launched each year. In this high-growth climate, Henley & Partners is committed to providing authoritative, on-the-ground insights to those working in the field of investment migration as well as to the broader public. It is in precisely this spirit that we hold our annual Global Residence and Citizenship Conference, which is all about mapping the major trends and developments shaping our industry and our world.”
The annual event, now in its 12th year, will take place in Dubai this year, from November 4-6.
Over 400 delegates from more than 40 different countries are expected to attend.