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The 'Economy of the Caribbean' is varied, but depends heavily on natural resources, agriculture and travel and tourism.
By international standards, minerals most valuable on the international market are found in Cuba, Jamaica, and Trinidad and Tobago. Several nations of the Caribbean are rich in natural resources; including Trinidad's vast natural gas and oil reserves, Jamaican bauxite and most recently the discovery of a large oil field in Guyana. The resources that make significant contributions to domestic economies and regional job sectors include fisheries, agriculture, forestry, mining and oil and gas bauxite, iron, nickel, petroleum and timber, among others. It has been noted by some that the Caribbean's most important resource is its tropical island setting, which has generated an important tourism sector. The attention by regional governments towards economic diversification in the early 1990s is often associated with increased production in tourism, oil, and nickel, spurred by foreign investment in these primary industries.
Along with contributing to the Caribbean's GDP, agriculture also contributes to domestic food supply and provides employment. While agriculture is the major economic land-use activity in many Caribbean countries, agriculture accounts for a declining percentage of most islands' GDP. However, unlike many developed countries, this trend may be accounted for by a growing tertiary sector, as opposed to industrial growth, except for Trinidad and Tobago and Mexico. Associations representing the agricultural industry in the region include the Caribbean Food Crop Society (CFCS) and the Windward Islands Farmers Association (WINFA). Some in Saint Vincent represent the interests of FairTrade certified producersand in Saint Vincent, Saint Lucia, Dominica and Grenada.
While globalization in its modern context undoubtedly has changed the dynamic of Caribbean economics, it is worth noting that “the countries of the commonwealth have been passively integrated into the international economy for all of their modern history”. From foundations built on the plantation economy, the Caribbean economy has always involved reliance on one or several export sectors. While numerous attempts at market diversification have been made, the struggle to develop the political and economic infrastructure necessary to successfully respond to market fluctuations, and loss of competitiveness, in key export sectors remains a struggle. A recent example includes the dismantling of the Lomé Convention, which provided Caribbean Banana exports preferential treatment from the EU, by the WTO in 1999. Recent studies have also looked at the qualitative difference of capitalist globalization in comparison to earlier eras of capitalism, and shown how the region is becoming enmeshed in the accumulation chains of transnational business elites. This process has not only entailed significant advancements but also deeply rooted crises and inequality. [1]
The European Investment Bank provided a $12 million loan to the Ministry of Finance in Barbados. This allowed the Barbados Water Authority (BWA) to rehabilitate the island's drinking water distribution network by improving efficiency, service quality, and resilience in order to mitigate the negative effects of climate change. [2] [3] This investment will help protect Barbados' water supply from climate change and more frequent extreme weather. [2] [3]
The European Investment Bank investment will pay for the replacement of around 16 kilometers of aging pipelines, as well as the restoration of water reservoirs and pumping facilities. This will help to preserve the island's scarce water resources. [2]
The European Investment Bank is also collaborating with the national government to fund $60 million in emergency healthcare spending connected to the COVID-19 pandemic. This is also in collaboration with The Caribbean Development Bank (CDB) to provide $36 million to CDB's Borrowing Member Countries (BMCs) for the COVID-19 vaccines and other investments in healthcare, to limit the virus's spread.
The loan will assist Barbados' public health system, specifically for COVID-19 treatment, lab capacity and equipment, quarantine facilities, IT equipment, vaccine storage, contact tracing systems, and logistics, transport, and monitoring operations.
In 2010 the labor force participation rate in the Caribbean was 77% and in 2011 it was recorded that GDP per capita in the Caribbean communities average near $10,000. Due to the lack of economic opportunity and low GDP per capita levels, Caribbean people are traveling in large numbers to developed countries. Globally, Grenada has the third-highest percentage of emigrating at 67.3%, St. Kitts and Nevis is fourth at 61.0% and Guyana is fifth at 56.8%. Most of these Caribbean emigrants are women.
Historically, the Caribbean's banana industry has been one of the biggest exports; however, agriculture is beginning to decline in the world economy. Now, it is the exportation of labor that is on the rise in the Caribbean. Caribbean women are migrating to developed countries for the opportunity to study particularly in nursing programs. Women in the Caribbean migrate in large numbers to developed countries such as the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom, and France. These host countries have better education and resources that provide better health care knowledge and health care training. In these developed regions of the word, Caribbean women receive more on and off-the-job training as well. Educational opportunities for health care allow women in the Caribbean to receive advanced knowledge on nursing and their degrees are recognized in their host countries.
With advanced education come more career opportunities. In the host countries, there is a lot of demand for healthcare workers, which means more job opportunities for women. Caribbean women also emigrate in such large numbers to developed countries to earn higher pay. Income earned in host countries is usually enough for a female immigrant from the Caribbean to live off of and still send remittances back home. Additionally, the currencies from host countries have more purchasing power than the domestic currency in the Caribbean. Money being sent back to Caribbean countries allows for individuals to set up retirement accounts and provide financial support to the families that the Caribbean women left behind.
The labor exportation from the Caribbean to the host countries is offering education and employment opportunities to women, but is also limiting the opportunities for the Caribbean. The educated women who want to learn advanced skills and have the potential to make a difference in and on their home countries are travelling abroad, and in large part are staying abroad to take full advantage of the education and the economic prospects. The health care education systems and quality of health care declines because the participants are leaving. Guyana is one of the top 10 countries that export labor. In the rural areas, 80% of their health care is provided by nurses. Lately, however, there been serious deficiencies and neglect in the health care market due to Caribbean nurses staying abroad after pursuing their education. Guyana's economy is also heavily dependent of remittances. Guyana is one of the top countries to benefit from remittances from nursing labor. The country's largest source of foreign exchange is remittances with there being approximately $218 million United States dollars counted in 2006 from remittances, money that did not include transfers from the informal sectors. This dependence on the developed foreign economy leaves Guyana vulnerable to any changes or crashes that the developed country may face. The remittances that Guyana is receiving are helping to sustain the economy but also have the potential effect of really crippling it, if nurses lose their jobs or receive pay cuts and can no longer send back a hefty amount of remittances.
The Caribbean governments are increasingly looking at the need for digital communications networks to help economic growth. [4]
The economy of the Dominican Republic is the seventh largest in Latin America, and is the largest in the Caribbean and Central American region. The Dominican Republic is an upper-middle income developing country with important sectors including mining, tourism, manufacturing, energy, real estate, infrastructure, telecommunications and agriculture. The Dominican Republic is on track to achieve its goal of becoming a high-income country by 2030, and is expected to grow 79% in this decade. The country is the site of the single largest gold mine in Latin America, the Pueblo Viejo mine.Although the service sector is currently the leading employer of Dominicans, agriculture remains an important sector in terms of the domestic market and is in second place in terms of export earnings. Tourism accounts for more than $7.4 billion in annual earnings in 2019. Free-trade zone earnings and tourism are the fastest-growing export sectors. A leading growth engine in the Free-trade zone sector is the production of medical equipment for export having a value-added per employee of $20,000 USD, total revenue of $1.5 billion USD, and a growth rate of 7.7% in 2019. The medical instrument export sector represents one of the highest-value added sectors of the country's economy, a true growth engine for the country's emerging market. Remittances are an important sector of the economy, contributing $8.2 billion in 2020. Most of these funds are used to cover household expenses, such as housing, food, clothing, health care and education. Secondarily, remittances have financed businesses and productive activities. Thirdly, this combined effect has induced investment by the private sector and helps fund the public sector through its value-added tax. The combined import market including the free-trade-zones amounts to a market of $20 billion a year in 2019. The combined export sector had revenues totaling $11 billion in 2019. The consumer market is equivalent to $61 billion in 2019. An important indicator is the average commercial loan interest rate, which directs short-term investment and stimulates long-term investment in the economy. It is currently 8.30%, as of June 2021.
The economy of Grenada is largely tourism-based, small, and open economy. Over the past two decades, the main thrust of Grenada's economy has shifted from agriculture to services, with tourism serving as the leading foreign currency earning sector. The country's principal export crops are the spices nutmeg and mace. Other crops for export include cocoa, citrus fruits, bananas, cloves, and cinnamon. Manufacturing industries in Grenada operate mostly on a small scale, including production of beverages and other foodstuffs, textiles, and the assembly of electronic components for export.
The economy of Guatemala is a considered a developing economy, highly dependent on agriculture, particularly on traditional crops such as coffee, sugar, and bananas. Guatemala's GDP per capita is roughly one-third of Brazil's. The Guatemalan economy is the largest in Central America. It grew 3.3 percent on average from 2015 to 2018. However, Guatemala remains one of the poorest countries in Latin America and the Caribbean, having highly unequal incomes and chronically malnourished children. The country is beset by political insecurity, and lacks skilled workers and infrastructure. It depends on remittances for nearly one-tenth of the GDP.
Haiti is a free market economy with low labor costs. A republic, it was a French colony before gaining independence in an uprising by its enslaved people. It faced embargoes and isolation after its independence as well as political crises punctuated by foreign interventions and devastating natural disasters. Haiti's estimated population in 2018 was 11,439,646. The Economist reported in 2010: "Long known as the poorest country in the Western hemisphere, Haiti has stumbled from one crisis to another since the Duvalier years."
The economy of Honduras is based mostly on agriculture, which accounts for 14% of its gross domestic product (GDP) in 2013. The country's leading export is coffee (US$340 million), which accounted for 22% of the total Honduran export revenues. Bananas, formerly the country's second-largest export until being virtually wiped out by 1998's Hurricane Mitch, recovered in 2000 to 57% of pre-Mitch levels. Cultivated shrimp is another important export sector. Since the late 1970s, towns in the north began industrial production through maquiladoras, especially in San Pedro Sula and Puerto Cortés.
The economy of Jamaica is heavily reliant on services, accounting for 71% of the country's GDP. Jamaica has natural resources and a climate conducive to agriculture and tourism. The discovery of bauxite in the 1940s and the subsequent establishment of the bauxite-alumina industry shifted Jamaica's economy from sugar, and bananas.
The economy of Nicaragua is focused primarily on the agricultural sector. Nicaragua itself is the least developed country in Central America, and the second poorest in the Americas by nominal GDP. In recent years, under the administrations of Daniel Ortega, the Nicaraguan economy has expanded somewhat, following the Great Recession, when the country's economy actually contracted by 1.5%, due to decreased export demand in the American and Central American markets, lower commodity prices for key agricultural exports, and low remittance growth. The economy saw 4.5% growth in 2010 thanks to a recovery in export demand and growth in its tourism industry. Nicaragua's economy continues to post growth, with preliminary indicators showing the Nicaraguan economy growing an additional 5% in 2011. Consumer Price inflation have also curtailed since 2008, when Nicaragua's inflation rate hovered at 19.82%. In 2009 and 2010, the country posted lower inflation rates, 3.68% and 5.45%, respectively. Remittances are a major source of income, equivalent to 15% of the country's GDP, which originate primarily from Costa Rica, the United States, and European Union member states. Approximately one million Nicaraguans contribute to the remittance sector of the economy.
The economy of Paraguay is a market economy that is highly dependent on agriculture products. In recent years, Paraguay's economy has grown as a result of increased agricultural exports, especially soybeans. Paraguay has the economic advantages of a young population and vast hydroelectric power. Its disadvantages include the few available mineral resources, and political instability. The government welcomes foreign investment.
Once a single-crop agricultural economy, Saint Lucia has shifted to a tourism and banking serviced-based economy. Tourism, the island's biggest industry and main source of jobs, income and foreign exchange, accounts for 65% of its GDP. Agriculture, which was once the biggest industry, now contributes to less than 3% of GDP, but still accounts for 20% of jobs. The banana industry is now on a decline due to strong competition from low-cost Latin American producers and reduced European trade preferences, but the government has helped revitalize the industry, with 13,734 tonnes exported in 2018. Agricultural crops grown for export are bananas, mangoes, and avocados. The island is considered to have the most diverse and well-developed manufacturing industry in the eastern Caribbean.
Syria's economic situation has been turbulent and their economy has deteriorated considerably since the beginning of the Syrian civil war, which erupted in March 2011.
The economy of Trinidad and Tobago is the third wealthiest in the Caribbean and the fifth-richest by GDP (PPP) per capita in the Americas. Trinidad and Tobago is recognised as a high-income economy by the World Bank. Unlike most of the English-speaking Caribbean, the country's economy is primarily industrial, with an emphasis on petroleum and petrochemicals. The country's wealth is attributed to its large reserves and exploitation of oil and natural gas.
The economy of Guyana is one of the fastest growing in the world with a gross domestic product (GDP) growth of 19.9% in 2021. In 2023, Guyana had a per capita gross domestic product of Int$60,648 and an average GDP growth of 4.2% over the previous decade. Guyana's economy was transformed in 2015 with the discovery of an offshore oil field in the country’s waters about 120 miles from Georgetown. Making the first commercial grade crude oil draw in December 2019, sending it abroad for refining.
The economy of Bangladesh is a major developing market economy. As the second-largest economy in South Asia, Bangladesh's economy is the 33rd largest in the world in nominal terms, and 25th largest by purchasing power parity. Bangladesh is seen by various financial institutions as one of the Next Eleven. It has been transitioning from being a frontier market into an emerging market. Bangladesh is a member of the South Asian Free Trade Area and the World Trade Organization. In fiscal year 2021–2022, Bangladesh registered a GDP growth rate of 7.2% after the global pandemic. Bangladesh is one of the fastest growing economies in the world.
Since the island country's independence in 1966, the economy of Barbados has been transformed from a low-income economy dependent upon sugar production into a high-income economy based on tourism and the offshore sector. Barbados went into a deep recession in the 1990s after 3 years of steady decline brought on by fundamental macroeconomic imbalances. After a painful re-adjustment process, the economy began to grow again in 1993. Growth rates have averaged between 3%–5% since then. The country's three main economic drivers are: tourism, the international business sector, and foreign direct-investment. These are supported in part by Barbados operating as a service-driven economy and an international business centre.
The economy of Bolivia is the 95th-largest in the world in nominal terms and the 87th-largest in purchasing power parity. Bolivia is classified by the World Bank to be a lower middle income country. With a Human Development Index of 0.703, it is ranked 114th. Driven largely by its natural resources, Bolivia has become a region leader in measures of economic growth, fiscal stability and foreign reserves, although it remains a historically poor country. The Bolivian economy has had a historic single-commodity focus. From silver to tin to coca, Bolivia has enjoyed only occasional periods of economic diversification. Political instability and difficult topography have constrained efforts to modernize the agricultural sector. Similarly, relatively low population growth coupled with low life expectancy has kept the labor supply in flux and prevented industries from flourishing. Rampant inflation and corruption previously created development challenges, but in the early twenty-first century the fundamentals of its economy showed unexpected improvement, leading Moody's Investors Service to upgrade Bolivia's economic rating in 2010 from B2 to B1. The mining industry, especially the extraction of natural gas and zinc, currently dominates Bolivia's export economy.
The economy of North America comprises more than 596 million people in its 24 sovereign states and 15 dependent territories. It is marked by a sharp division between the predominantly English speaking countries of Canada and the United States, which are among the wealthiest and most developed nations in the world, and countries of Central America and the Caribbean in the former Latin America that are less developed. Mexico and Caribbean nations of the Commonwealth of Nations are between the economic extremes of the development of North America.
Gender inequality in the English Caribbean refers to gaps between individuals based on gender in the Anglophone countries of the Caribbean. These gaps persist in the areas of human and physical capital endowments, in economic opportunities, and in the ability to make choices to achieve desired outcomes (agency).
Latin America as a region has multiple nation-states, with varying levels of economic complexity. The Latin American economy is an export-based economy consisting of individual countries in the geographical regions of North America, Central America, South America, and the Caribbean. The socioeconomic patterns of what is now called Latin America were set in the colonial era when the region was controlled by the Spanish and Portuguese empires. Up until independence in the early nineteenth century, colonial Latin American regional economies thrived and worked things out. Many parts of the region had favorable factor endowments of deposits of precious metals, mainly silver, or tropical climatic conditions and locations near coasts that allowed for the development of cane sugar plantations. In the nineteenth century following independence, many economies of Latin America declined. In the late nineteenth century, much of Latin America was integrated into the world economy as an exporter of commodities. Foreign capital investment, construction of infrastructure, such as railroads, growth in the labor sector with immigration from abroad, strengthening of institutions, and expansion of education aided industrial growth and economic expansion. A number of regions have thriving economies, but "poverty and inequality have been deeply rooted in Latin American societies since the early colonial era."
Tajikistan did not join in the World Bank until 1993. Before the collapse of USSR in 1991, Tajikistan was experiencing planned economy which was dominated by Moscow. Right after the dissolution, different from other nations which experienced a relatively stable transition from planned economy to market economy, Tajikistan fell into a serious civil war. As a result, the first mission after Tajikistan became the official member of the World Bank, was to recover its economy from bullets and blood. In 1997. $10 million credit was grant for Post-Conflict Rehabilitation Project. The proposed credit was used to conduct necessary imports and to restore production. Under different time periods, the World Bank and Tajikistan worked together in response to various problems. Later on, the economic crisis of 2008 caused the inflation of food prices in Tajikistan. In response to the crisis, the World Bank issued $6.25 million for the Emergency Food Security and Seed Imports Project in order to help at least 28000 households to release the food price pressure. Coming into the 21st century, Tajikistan received financing from IDA and IBRD of the World Bank with respect to programs of healthcare, education, irrigation and agriculture. Over the past years, Tajikistan has received over 130 projects of which 17 are active and a total of over $1.4 billion from the World Bank. With the help of those projects, from 2000 to 2017, the poverty rate in Tajikistan had been decreased from 83% to 29.5%. Besides, current GDP growth rate in Tajikistan is around 7%. Nevertheless, with a stable GDP growth rate, Tajikistan is still one of the poorest countries in Central Asia.
Banking in Guyana follows the country's tumultuous economics history, from formal introduction under British rule, the socialist-oriented nationalization of banks at independence, to IMF sponsored open-market initiatives. The banking industry faces increased pressure to meet global standards domestically, as well as attract international investors, and serve the large number of diaspora that remain economically tied to the country.
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