By: Staff Writer
February 9, 2024
Regional Economist, Marla Dukharan, in her annual Caribbean Economic Report, said that things like not measuring poverty coupled with rising homicide rates will undo much of the economic growth that Caribbean economies will experience in 2024.
Ms Dukharan noted that all of the countries in the region will experience growth as the global economy grows with an average between 4 percent and 2 percent across the region, but a few hurdles will weigh them down this year. “There are a few social issues which I am seeing and feeling a deterioration across the region. And this deterioration could undermine the important economic progress that we are making.”
She also said: “First, we can’t make enough noise about this, which is the fact that most countries in the Caribbean apart from Jamaica and the Dominican Republic, are not measuring poverty. And unless we measure it, meaning unless we know who is affected, where they are, what is causing it. We can’t target unnecessary interventions to solve poverty. And if our leaders can’t, or won’t, or don’t solve poverty and improve the lives of Caribbean people, especially the most vulnerable people, then why are they even here?” she questioned.
The poverty rate for Latin America and the Caribbean went from 28.3 percent in 2019 to 30.3 percent in 2021. Unemployment is also significantly high, adding to this poverty trap.
She also said: “I’m seeing high crime and homicide rates persisting in countries across the region. Although Jamaica notably saw a 7.8 percent decline in homicides last year.
“But on an international scale, Jamaica, Belize, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, St. Kitts and Nevis, the Bahamas and Trinidad and Tobago are still among the highest homicide rates globally and in Trinidad and Tobago, we saw the nation’s largest taxpayer, BPTT, take action to protect people in response to the spike in homicides taking place right now.. We are going in the wrong direction.”
The third challenge is, “health tied to population and demographic shifts.” Ms Dukharan noted, “Coming out of the pandemic, we are acutely aware of the weaknesses in our healthcare systems, but also the rising health risks we are facing from external factors like mosquito borne diseases and also Sahara dust exacerbating respiratory illnesses, or only made worse by the climate crisis.”
There is also the lifestyle related non communicable diseases, mental health channel challenges and those associated with it with an aging population that is “aging fast and not aging healthy.” In some cases, populations in the region are “actually shrinking, such as in Barbados, Cuba, Jamaica, Martinique, Aruba, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, the US Virgin Islands, Bermuda and Montserrat.”
She also said: “Younger and younger people are being affected by serious illnesses. Governments across the Caribbean aren’t doing enough to understand and respond to the deteriorating health of our people, partly because we aren’t measuring and can’t necessarily see the impact that poor health is having on our overall progress. It is holding us back with declining populations also grow up caused by brain drain, we have to think about economic planning for smaller and older populations, which is not something they teach us in school, we are only taught about creating growth in years to come we will be converting schools to elderly class care centres,” She further warned that the Caribbean needs to be ready for this “slow moving tsunami.”