Dear Editor,

Jamaicans get great psychic pleasure from reaping a treasure trove of medals in the Summer Olympic Games. When we fail to produce the expected harvest, as in the just-ended Paris Olympics, we collectively become crestfallen, almost to the point of depression.

The pain is worsened by the fact that we do not have much else to look forward to other than the feeling that we beat nations that are much bigger and richer than us. It is as if we are competing under the weight of a national inferiority complex, which is lifted only when our standing is near the top of the medal tables.

Not so for the big, rich nations. They too want to win medals, but win or lose, they are the ones laughing all the way to the bank. The reason is simple. They are active participants in the global sports industry, estimated in a study by Drs Roger Best and Dennis Howard to generate revenue of US$471 billion to US$1.4 trillion annually. We only go to perform. It’s questionable whether we even have a sports industry.

In the United States, for example, the sports industry is a well-coordinated revenue generator for the economy. Estimates put earnings in 2019 at over US$75 billion. Money pours in from four main revenue streams: gate receipts, media rights, sponsorships, and merchandise. Add to that the multiplier effect from massive public and private investment in sporting and training venues and facilities; manufacture of sports equipment, apparel, footwear, and accessories; contribution in terms of earnings from employment and other economic activities that are hard to disaggregate and value because they are so diffused in the larger economy, and one begins to get a measure of the significant economic contribution of an activity that’s now part of an integrated global industry.

How many of these revenue-generating activities do we see taking place in Jamaica to any appreciable degree? Other than jumping up and down in front of our television sets or in Half-Way-Tree shouting gold each time Jamaica makes it to the top of the podium, how much does the country really earn based on the athletic prowess of the likes of Usain Bolt, Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce, Asafa Powell, Elaine Thompson Herah, and their successors? When it comes to the business aspect of sports, we have proven ourselves to be inept at even upgrading the 62-year-old National Stadium or making the Trelawny Stadium self-sustaining.

Until we take meaningful action towards treating sports as the wealth-creating industry it is, Jamaica will remain a country known for its athletic prowess, producing sports icons who earn money for themselves but failing to increase the wealth of the nation. Rising gross domestic product (GDP) is the only thing that can do that.

Let’s think on these things.

Henley Morgan

hmorgan@cwjamaica.com