It will be interesting to see how the call made by Banks Holdings Limited’s chief executive officer Richard Cozier for Barbados to “take the kid gloves off” and ignore Trinidad and Tobago products on the market shelves eventually pans out.
So far the twin-island state has apologized and is working to correct the brewing trade dispute over the labelling of the Pine Hill Dairy’s milk products; and the topic will feature in talks between the trade ministers of Barbados and Trinidad and Tobago this week.
But in terms of putting pressure on the twin-island in regard to trade or commerce, similar calls have been made by Barbadians for many years, particularly in light of the inability to effect a fishing agreement between Barbados and Trinidad and Tobago.
Prime Ministers have voiced their disapproval, Gabby immortalized the “cou cou and flying fish” situation in song, and the usual ink has been spilled, but after more than 30 years any Bajan fishing in the waters of our main trading partner is still likely to face imprisonment or worse.
Then there’s the obvious imbalance of products on the supermarket shelves: $1 billion in imports here compared to $111 million in exports to Trinidad last year, according to recent figures from Minister of Trade and Commerce Haynesley Benn.
I’m not saying the current barriers are deliberate, but it is no surprise that Trinidad or any other CARICOM country would frustrate the system in relation to products of Barbados or any other regional partner. Because none, as far as I know, has been as faithful as Barbados in upholding the tenets of CARICOM, particularly in relation to imports.
And this has so long been taken for granted that whenever Barbados has to put its foot down on any regional issue – whether it be related to illegal immigrants or getting REDjet to land at Piarco – this country is harshly and loudly criticized.
In the meantime, this 166-square-mile rock welcomes massive Trini investment, including almost-total buyout of the island’s national bank and main shipping and trading conglomerate, while the natural gas pipeline from Tobago to Barbados will soon be implemented as well.
To put it simply, Barbados is Trinidad and Tobago’s best friend. Which other country in the region – or the world – would include a non-citizen among its pantheon of National Heroes?
So while Minister Benn’s figures of imports from that country are revealing – an imbalance of almost ten to one – they should not be alarming.
Trinidad’s apology notwithstanding, we wait with bated breath to hear exactly why the Pine Hill Dairy has not been able to sell a drop of milk there in the past 18 months while our supermarket shelves have been flooded with Trinidad?products.
Perhaps it’s time for Prime Minister Stuart, armed with the data of thorough investigation, to speak to this issue as candidly as he did when REDjet was being stalled last year.
Farewell to Yarde
TODAY I join many Barbadians in mourning the loss of one of the most committed football stalwarts to have walked this land.
I met Sherlock Yarde when I was a sports reporter covering football at the National Stadium, where he sat in the same area for decades. Administrators like him, Randy Harris and Adrian Donovan were kind to a young reporter who understood the rudiments of the game but very little else. These were the men to turn to for the technical aspects, information on players, and even story ideas.
With local football, Yarde will always be synonymous, in particular with the Bay Land-based Notre Dame, some of whose players were my Bay Primary contemporaries.
Rest in peace, Nat.
Missing a friend
A MONTH HAS NOT yet gone but I’m beginning to miss a workmate.
It’s a friendship cultivated over 20 years but it feels like only yesterday we would have shared a plate of lunch, laughed at some silly office joke or chatted briefly on the office lines.
It’s a friendship that has been tested through fire and flood.
But it survived, not as a result of our feeble efforts which were nearly always limited by emotions that tend to blind sound reasoning, but by the grace of God alone whose wisdom had the final say.
As I walk the corridors of my workplace, they become a bit of a monument to someone with whom I could share sad news as easily as I could “skin my teet”; a reminder of conversations far outside of the office. Those were conversations that, despite our best efforts, would nearly always centre on this vibrant workplace where cutting edge news was deftly balanced with oft-hilarious and rejuvenating bits of social interaction.
Some of those casual chats sparked many an idea for this weekly column.
But why bore you, dear reader, with details of the lives of two humble NATION employees, when all that matters at this moment is that I miss my friend?
• Ricky Jordan is an associate
editor of the Nation.
