“A FEELING OF gratitude and a sense of honour, privilege and optimism.”
Freundel Stuart, Barbados’ Prime Minister was articulating his thoughts to the Barbadian diaspora, painting a picture for nationals abroad on the occasion of Barbados’ 45th anniversary of Independence.
Several years ago, Kofi Annan, then United Nations Secretary-General, on a visit to Barbados, described it as a country that “punches above its weight”. Statements from a host of international institutions in recent years are solid proof of the accuracy of Annan’s description.
Some examples:
– Barbados has the UN’s highest ranking in Latin America and the Caribbean when it comes to education, health, child survival and other quality of life indices.
– Transparency International, a European body, considers Barbados one of the least corrupt nations in the Americas.
– The World Economic Forum rated it as one of the most highly competitive countries in the Western Hemisphere and put its infrastructure a notch higher than that of the United States.
-The World Bank has listed Barbados among the world’s high income states.
-Last year, the UNDP last year placed Barbados for the first time among the world’s “developed” countries when it came to human development alone.
“In my lifetime, I have visited over 50 countries and have lived for at least a year in five of them and I am yet to see a country with 280 000 people that has achieved more than Barbados,” John Beale, the Ambassador to the United States, said.
However, none of the high watermarks should be interpreted to mean that Barbados isn’t facing serious financial and social problems. Like its neighbours, it is feeling the full brunt of the global economic debacle. Also true, its unemployment rate is sky-high and climbing. Its mountain of domestic and foreign debt is like a millstone around the necks of the population; the Government’s deficit is growing; and inflation is on the rise.
The simple truth is that the country is probably living beyond its means, and it has not always managed its economy as it should have.
Crime is also on the increase and moral values are declining.
The country’s first task must be to stop the slippage in its social and economic profile and in how people relate to each other at home, to their Caribbean neighbours, and with the diaspora. The haughtiness should stop.
There must be a greater drive in the area of entrepreneurship and the discipline for which Barbadians were known a mere five or ten years ago must return.
The Barbadian diaspora’s commitment to their country’s future growth must remain unshakeable.
In the past six years Bajans abroad have remitted more than $500 million to their relatives back home and they must continue in that vein. But there is more they can do. They can help in the process of maintaining standards that would set the country apart.
On balance, the island-nation has done well, very well, but it can do even better.
