Barbados is moving too slowly to develop new industries.
This was the view posited by Jeremy Stephen, Economist and Lecturer of the University of the West Indies.
Speaking to The Barbados Advocate, he acknowledged that while research is imperative, our neighbours are going ahead and strengthening their economy through diversification in different areas such as Cannabis.
According to him, “We are moving too slow to adapt to the new economy. We need to face the reality, we no longer have those competitive advantages we once had. As a country, we must realise that the generation coming behind us cannot look at things the way we look at it.
“Furthermore, for Barbadians to continue in the lifestyle we have become accustomed, we are moving too slow entering into new industries. St. Vincent has moved ahead of Barbados and looking to full legalisation of Cannabis and St. Kitts made the decision to de-criminalise Cannabis and they don’t grow anything, but they see the economic impacts. We are allowing our neighbours to get ahead with respect to competitiveness in different areas such as in the area of Cannabis, while we continue to hold on to the stigma while countries are diversifying.”
Stephen pointed out, “I don’t think we really realise how vulnerable we are. We are a small economy and what allowed us in the past to stay viable is that we had major competitive advantage with respect to Tourism and Sugar; we no longer have that competitive edge. The International Business sector had to diversify into other countries such as Africa, etc., therefore we cannot fear change.”
Also, in terms of technological advances and areas such as Bitcoin, digital money, etc., he said, “We are moving too slowly in these dynamic areas; the actors in that field are waiting for legislation to support what they do. Our current legislation is quite weak when it comes to IT security…
“We need to go a step further in schools and introduce coding. The education system as a matter of importance has to introduce coding at some level in some way, the same way you do Mathematics. The future blue-collar job is coding as it seeps its way into a lot of functions. It is the Information Age, it has to be in the primary schools coming up. UWI has sought to modernise its courses to look at the practical application of coding and more students know how to do apps, etc. There are also sources online that parents can introduce their young children to coding – this is the future.” (NB)