I note with a good bit of dismay that the Barbados Government is getting ready to invest a huge sum of money in the sugar cane industry in an attempt to revive it.
To my way of thinking, this is basically flogging a dead horse – or rather, a dying horse. There are other kinds of agriculture that can be encouraged.
There is, however, another point of view which would be relevant to the argument that sugar should be done away with.
The real foreign exchange earner for Barbados is the indispensable tourist industry. Can you imagine just how boring it is for tourists who come here to see nothing but dreary old sugar canes all over the countryside?
It would be far more interesting to see pastures, grasses, bushes and trees; far more interesting to see sheep grazing, goats grazing, cattle grazing. Even the so-called rab land would be better, in my opinion.
If crops such as tobacco or maize were planted, at least they would not grow so high as to obscure the rest of the land alongside which they were planted.
Cane fields are boring to look at. Furthermore, after the canes have been reaped, there is nothing but bare fields left, covered with cane trash. This is even more boring than the fields themselves.
Incidentally, I think that it would be a good idea for tourists who come here to be encouraged not only to ride through the countryside in coaches, but wherever possible to get out and walk in the fields and on the hills.
I would not advise them to walk in the gullies because Bajans have dumped too much rubbish in them over the years. I do not include Welchman Hall Gully, of course.
Incidentally, I highly applaud the effort being made by locals to clean up the gullies. I do not, however, believe these efforts can be sufficiently successful to render the gullies hospitable to tourists and locals alike yet. That will probably take years.
What about using the hills of the East Coast Road and Bathsheba – those immediately to the west of the road – as a hiking attraction?