One Caribbean nation

“One flag, one land, one heart, one hand/One nation, evermore”: Oliver Wendell Holmes, Voyage of the Good Ship Union.

Generations of Caribbean political leaders have failed to deal positively with the issues of political and economic integration, not recognising as has Europe, a Region once fractured by several major wars, that a single voice, on say, economic affairs, is a thousand times more effective than several discordant national notes.

A united English speaking Caribbean, and ultimately Spanish and Dutch speaking, will stand a better chance of having its position on critical economic issues respected in the run up to the establishment of the Free Trade Area of the Americas, for example, than would Grenada, Trinidad and Tobago, Jamaica, Barbados or Guyana, all acting singly. The creation of the Caribbean Single Market and Economy, even in advance of a needed political union will result in the automatic coming together of Regional States to protect the interests of a fellow Caribbean country, and ipso facto theirs, should the country be required to make out a case before the World Trade Organisation against dumping by an international predator.

Today, a plea by Jamaica, Antigua, Trinidad and Tobago or St Lucia, against dumped or subsidised imports, even though it succeeds on the ground that it is causing or even threatening material injury to a domestic industry, the exporter can simply shift the pursuit of business to another island State, except there is a bi-lateral agreement in force, on the basis of which the second country acts. Should there be Caribbean union, then the regional Government can, as a member of the WTO, and adhering to the organisation’s Anti-Dumping and Subsidy codes, appeal to the WTO to block the dumping. And even as it awaits a verdict it can impose Anti-Dumping and Countervailing Duties.

The importance of this cannot be ignored. At present, should dumping of cement takes place in Jamaica, then the Caribbean Cement Company Limited [CCCL] there would lose earnings and the Government’s needed revenue, including Corporation Tax. Jobs could also be at stake, and this would lead to an additional loss, this time of Personal Income Tax. There would be a domino reaction in Trinidad and Tobago, whose Trinidad Cement Limited [TCL] is the principal shareholder of CCCL, and in Barbados, where the TCL subsidiary, Arawak Cement company, is based. The economic growth of these three countries would be affected.

Although I have cited and paid particular attention to the question of dumping and measures to counteract it, the question of Caribbean integration goes well beyond. It will mean the free movement of people and skills throughout the Region, as well as additionally encouraging the movement of money, which will point to further Caribbean economic and industrial growth and job opportunities. This will lead to a cross fertilisation of skills, and with personnel from each Caribbean unit benefiting from, as well as benefiting the Regional States in which their services have been made available on contract. They return to their respective territories better equipped. Ultimately, the skilled and semi-skilled persons, alongside whom they have worked will profit.

Their upgraded skills will lead to increased efficiency and their output will, in turn, be more cost effective. In a larger sense it is the Caribbean Community, now expanding from English speaking to embracing Spanish speaking and Dutch speaking areas as well, which will benefit. Critical to this upgrading of skills is the already established University of Jamaica and the planned University of Trinidad and Tobago, with its initial emphasis on science, technology, engineering. Both the Jamaican and Trinidadian and Tobagonian Universi-ties, particularly the proposed TT tertiary institution should seriously consider the awarding of full and/or partial scholarships to deserving students of the Eastern Caribbean.

The rationale being that what is of critical import is both the upgrading of skills and the making available on as wide a scale as possible, skills development to persons throughout the Regional units, who by their demonstrated aptitude, in and following on secondary schools, have qualified themselves for these educational opportunities. The establishing of the CSME will mean also the lowering of the cost of living as goods from the various countries of the Caribbean Community will enter each country free of duties and, if as conceived, will reach the shelves at reduced cost. The abolition of duties on imports of CARICOM goods will place them in a more competitive position vis a vis imports from outside of the Region.

Several Jamaican companies have invested as well as marketed their companies’ products in various CARICOM Member States. Today, Grace, Kennedy and Company Limited’s products are getting to be as well known in Belize, Guyana, Bermuda, St Lucia and Trinidad and Tobago as they are in Jamaica. Barbadian and TT companies are also vying, and successfully, for that honour and its economic rewards. We have tarried long in the vineyard, and the need to take Caribbean integration the critical steps further is there. There are leaders who worked toward the elusive Caribbean integration dream, long before the famous Montego Bay Conference of 1947, and certainly prior to early steps toward European Union. The formation of the sadly ill-fated April 22, 1958-May 23, 1962 West Indies Federation was brought about decades before the Treaty of Rome.

Within recent times, the Secretary General of the Caribbean Community, Dr Edwin Carrington, has been once again vigorously marketing The Caribbean Single Market and the Economy, and with it Caribbean Union. Hopefully, Carrington’s initiative and the initiatives of others will lead the Caribbean and its peoples to the long deferred Promised Land. Or as the late Prime Minister of Jamaica, Norman Manley, had said so feelingly that day in 1958 - “through the gates of the new Jerusalem”.