Congratulations are due to Barbados – “Bimshire”, on graduating to the ranks of a “developed” country, thereby moving up in the world order as shown in the United Nations Human Development Index. The HDI, now in its 20th year, measures performances in health, education, income and other quality of life indices. The qualities of life which have contributed to Barbados’s beneficial outcome are reported as follows: “After it became independent from the United Kingdom on November 30, 1966, Barbados devoted a significant share of the government’s annual budget to investing in human capital. Formal education at all levels is freely available to all, and health coverage is universal. The island has since reaped the benefits of these policies, having one of the highest literacy rates (99.7 per cent) in the world and ranking fourth among all developing countries (and 27th overall) in the UN Human Development Index with a life expectancy at birth of 76.6 years. However, given its relatively small size, it remains extremely vulnerable to external shocks and pressure put on its delicate ecosystem, while being highly dependent on the successful performance of a very limited number of sectors to finance its development”. The above is a brief encapsulation of the merits on which Bimshire’s elevation to developed country status is based.

Barbadians are a warm and friendly people who go out of their way to make visitors feel welcome. Barbados is a proud country, which has no abject poverty with unemployment hovering around 9 per cent, but with the spectre of crime and violence beginning to raise its ugly head threatening to disrupt the country’s economic progress. Sinister accounts from residents abound relating to the dangers besetting them due to the rising tide of criminal activity. Sadly, Barbados’s pristine goodwill reputation was tarnished by difficulties surrounding the alleged aberrant behaviour of Immigration Officers at the Grantley Adams International Airport towards certain Jamaican visitors. These incidents are still under investigation.

Significant resources have been invested in infrastructure improvement principally in sewerage and roadways. With the annual import of motor vehicles and with limited square miles and a dense population of approximately 268,300 people, continuous upgrading of main carriageways is necessary to reduce traffic gridlock that is commonplace. However, full credit is due for the condition of the highway network that links the eastern environs with the highly developed west coast of the island.

Barbados’s economy is built on micro and small enterprises with services contributing to approximately 80 per cent of GDP replacing agriculture, including sugar, as the main foreign exchange earner. Tourism and financial services are the mainstays of the economy. A Green Paper in 2001 and the Tourism Development Act of 2002 established a legal framework offering incentives to all aspects of the industry and to facilitate further development of a high quality tourism product to foster sustainable tourism and consolidate Barbados as an upscale tourist destination.

Thrift plays a large part in Barbadian culture which has proved to be of great assistance in their dealings with money and its uses. Jokingly, the slogan that typifies this cultural characteristic is quoted in friendly circles as: “a Bajan spree is a Coca Cola split in three!” A report informs thus: “In the vital area of health, the UN report puts Barbados’s per capita expenditure on health care at US $1,265 in 2007, a figure that was only surpassed in the region by the Bahamas with US$1,987. Trinidad and Tobago had a per capita expenditure of US$1,178. Barbados’s per capita spending on health was at least three times greater than Jamaica’s US$357, about six times higher than Guyana’s US$197 and at least US$400 per person more than Chile, Kuwait, Mexico and Brazil.

Similar to Jamaica now resuscitating its railway system, the Barbadian railway owes its notoriety to its cantankerous behaviour that was the butt of humorous jokes during its lifetime. Featured in the book, Bygone Barbados, by Ann Watson Yates is an account of the railway’s reputation: “The only way to Bathsheba with heavy luggage was by train: prior to that it was a hazardous journey by horse or mule. The Barbados Railway was actually five successive companies. Mr EA Stoute, a local historian remarked that Barbadians used to joke that the railway was mentioned in the Bible as being “one of the creeping things that crawl on the face of the earth”. At one spot with a severe gradient, students from the nearby theological college sometimes had to come out to push the train. The Railway Rule Book was also basic: “If the engine be defective, the sooner the train can be stopped the better.” It was a rule of thumb that, in times of difficulty, the third-class passengers got out and pushed, while the second-class passengers got out and walked alongside, and the first-class passengers remained seated, no doubt offering verbal solace to the lesser-ranked passengers”.

However, Jamaica’s longer process time envisioned for acquisition of developed status, is in part due to retiring its debt overhang, that may take more than two decades unless government can kick-start the economy, thereby improving national revenues while continuing to cut expenditure, both prudential measures that could be the salvation of the nation. Jamaica does not possess the characteristic of thrift; on the contrary is more prone to be spendthrift. Vision 2030 therefore becomes for future purposes a moving target.

We wish Bimshire good luck and prosperity in their new rank. Forward ever…!