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WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE WRITTEN BY YAO ATUNWA
The unprecedented event that is still unfolding in the region and globally, the Covid-19 pandemic as it was declared by the World Health Organization (WHO) on March 11th , 2020, will no doubt leave an impact unmatched by any event in modern world history; thus, notwithstanding the brutal destruction of the lives of millions of Africans at the hands of European colonizers/enslavers, or the annihilation of the Tainos and other indigenous peoples in our part of the world from outright slaughter in conjunction with the ravage of foreign diseases. As Mia Mottley, Prime Minister of Barbados and the current Chairperson of Caricom [when the article was penned], summarily stated in
an interview with CNN’s Christiane Amanpour (April 29th), “It has been the most destabilizing event for our countries.” The impact of this virus on the lives of people in the region — one that is very dependent on travel and trade and in particular tourism — has been horrendous thus far; more so in the form of an economic slowdown directly resulting from the shutdown of most of the commercial activities, as well as the borders in our little Grenada (and similarly across other Caricom states). Reports are in from economists both in the region and those situated at the United Nations and elsewhere that the region is set to lose greatly from the absence of a viable tourism sector precisely because of the region’s
Photo credit: Gettys Images/Paulo Costa
heavy reliance on that sector, accounting for near or over 50 percent of the GDPs of many Caricom states, including Grenada’s. These economists have also highlighted a contraction of over 20 percent for many economies in the region, a conservative estimate, for the more realistic figure is more in the neighborhood of 30 percent and more due to the direct and indirect role that tourism serves in these economies, as it tends to boost other sectors and businesses such as construction and food and beverage, and an array of service-based and auxiliary businesses. I should add that the projection is that tourism will not return for the remainder of the year and most of 2021 for a number of factors all
VISION MAGAZINE
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