WASHINGTON, DC – A senior World Bank official Wednesday said that while several countries in the Caribbean have been very good at training workers that are very valued in other parts of the world, it puts a” little bit of a damper on that driver of growth”.
Chief Economist for Latin America and the Caribbean, William Maloney, speaking at news conference on Wednesday (CMC Photo)The Chief Economist for Latin America and the Caribbean, William Maloney, told reporters that “greater regional integration and trade is…a goal we should be pursuing”.
Presenting the World Bank’s latest Latin America and the Caribbean Economic Update, titled “Reconsidering Industrial Policy,” Maloney greater regional integration and trade is “something that we’re…not particularly good at, either in South America or in the Caribbean.
“You get the usual gains of scale, efficiency of disciplining your industries, all those things are good. Fact is that a huge part of trade, though, is technology transfer and just exposure to different ways of doing things, new products, new technologies.
“And so, greater integration within the region can’t be the silver bullet for our growth issue. We have to be more integrated with the countries that have these new technologies and the like. “
Maloney said that the Caribbean has reached a “certain level of integration”, but questioned “how much more they’re going to achieve in the next couple years.
“I think there is a larger issue that we need to be thinking about with very mobile workforces and what kind of growth model we have. In terms of brain circulation, several countries in the Caribbean have been very good at training workers that are very valued in other parts of the world.
“it’s not so much the trade issues, and maybe the movement in people. Which puts…a little bit of a damper on that driver of growth. And I also think we need to think more as countries about and how we make that…sustainable economically.
“It can’t be that we’re training workers for richer countries, and don’t get much out of it as a region. The other thing I’d suggest is we need to be thinking more in this context about services.”
Maloney said that by nature, the islands of the Caribbean are small in scale, “so we’re not going to have major manufacturing happening in most of the islands.
“But it is possible, given the internet and given the rise in services as part of the global economy that the islands can serve as basis for relatively small scale, but nonetheless very high value-added service provision industries.
“And I think, particularly with English as a primary language in most of the region, that’s a real opportunity to be exploring,” Maloney told reporters.
According to the World Bank, The Bahamas will register growth of 2.2 per cent this year, declining to 1.9 per cent in 2027, while Barbados growth this year is 2.7 per cent increasing to three per cent in 2027.
Belize will register economic growth of 2.4 per cent this year, decreasing slightly to 2.2 per cent in 2027, while Dominica’s growth of 2.8 per cent this year, will increase slightly to 2.9 the following year.
Grenada’s economic growth of 3.1 per cent this year, will decline slightly to three per cent next year, while Guyana with economic growth of 16.3 per cent this year, will register growth of 23.5 per cent in 2027.
Haiti will have growth of 0.6 per cent this year, climbing to 1.9 per cent next year, while Jamaica’s minus one per cent economic decline this year will improve to 3.2 per cent in 2027.
St. Lucia will register economic growth of 1.9 per cent this year, declining slightly to 1.8 the following year, while St. Vincent and the Grenadines’ economic growth of three per cent this year will be bettered the following year, reaching 3.1 per cent, and Suriname is also expected to register growth moving from four per cent this year to 4.5 per cent in 2027.
Trinidad and Tobago’s economic growth of 0.7 per cent this year will increase to 3.2 per cent next year, according to the World Bank projections.
