Natural disasters and the economy of the Caribbean

vivatifosi

In recent weeks we've seen major natural disasters hitting the Caribbean region. From two earthquakes in Mexico, to the succession of hurricanes that have hit.

Harvey thankfully didn't impact the region before hitting Houston. However Irma caused extensive damage to Barbuda, the British Virgin Islands, Cuba, Haiti, and the Turks and Caicos before hitting Florida. Maria has done extensive damage to Dominica, Guadeloupe and not least Puerto Rico.

As these countries enter their recovery phase, they face a long fight back. In Puerto Rico there is no electricity and power is expected to take six months to restore. If that's the case in Puerto Rico, which is likely to at some stage become the 51st US state, what hope is there for places that are poorer, such as Dominica, or where the destruction wrought has been massive, such as Tortola?

We were lucky enough, many years ago to visit Grenada. It was the most beautiful, lush, verdant place, with food growing naturally everywhere. If you weren't wealthy, you wouldn't go hungry. Then hurricane Ivan hit. The impact on the island was devastating. The lush interior was wrecked. It was several years later that we returned but the impact had been awful. Grenada was known as the Spice Isle and its nutmeg production was decimated and people in the processing plant laid off. It took five years of funding and support from institutions such as the World Bank, IMF and EU to rebuild. The damage was estimated at 2x the nation's GDP.

So we may experience minor inconvenience such as banana prices increasin, but they face real hardship. What are your views as to what should be done to help?

michaels

This is a tricky one, obviously buildings can be built to withstand hurricanes (given enough money) but a much less capital intensive alternative might be a fw hardened shelters and other buildings being considered 'disposable'.

But even if they sort out the buildings there is then the question of the economies. Perhaps they need to concentrate on crops that can withstand hurricanes or just be replaced in a single growing season? And other industries that are not so dependent - most modern tourist hotels can probably be built to withstand the damage(?) and offshore banking/gambling I guess can carry on as long as power supplies can be maintained.

I guess one thing that could be done is states should try to maintain emergency funds a bit like Norway's sovereign wealth fund to tide them over periods of reduced income and to pay for repairs and there is a role for insurance, perhaps via cooperation between a large number of the at risk islands so that the burden of a disaster affecting 1 or 2 can be shared between many.

Of course none of this is easy politically even for high GDP per capita countries so it is desperately difficult for already poor ones. I guess it would be possible to make a case for a more centralised economic policy a la China where some degree of personal freedom is given up in return for growth focused policies with plans for national resilience but it is very hard to do this right and not end up more like Cuba, Venezuela or North Korea....

vivatifosi

My personal view is that they should at a very least have the funds to build a safe space into schools, hospital and perhaps local facilities so that there is somewhere to "hunker down".

I also think that we in the UK have a duty to help some of these countries, given that they are either British Overseas Territories or members of the Commonwealth. We can't say "oh, we will be trading with our more natural trading partners such as the Commonwealth" when we leave the EU, then turn our backs at the first signs of trouble.

There is also a surprising amount of Chinese infrastructural funding in the Caribbean, so nations should work together to provide help.

michaels

This seem slike exactly where international aid should be spent - funds to pay for infrastructure and rebuilding as a one off to put the countries back on their feet at which point it is for them to make a go of it - much better than paying countries for years and years just enough to prevent starvation but leaving them dependent.

I assume we can just ignore the rules that say aid can not be given to a country because its per capita income is to high - sure it may not qualify under international definitions but the point is is the help needed now and will it do some good, not how will the UK appear on some arbitrary league table of international donors.

Conrad

I watched a few Select Committees a couple of months back that interviewed heads of British Caribbean protectorates and was interested to learn we pay each of these huge sums (hundreds of millions to some) each year. I actually had not realised we were subsidising these economies.

masterwilde

Im on a list of volunteers to help those in the Caribbean in the coming months once the dangers are finished and the clean up has been done

vivatifosi

Out of interest masterwilde, do you have a trade that you were able to sign up with? Is there a place that other interested people can sign up to help?

It's a great idea, I wish you the best of luck with your efforts.

zagubov

I believe Club med were looking into a scheme (long before t'internet era) called the Skills for Sunlight exchange. The idea was that people with useful skills or trades could retire to places that could use or pass on their skills to local communities in exchange for life in a warmer country with a lower cost of living. A bit like the VSO but aimed at retirees.

There needs to be a lot more international cooperation of the kind masterwilde is taking part in. Shame there's no large organisations matching local needs with people who can help, who could help countries like this when needed.

masterwilde

habitat humanity is the charity i am registered with. They focus on stage 2 help of rebuilding and proving shelter and such. this is after the initial clean up

masterwilde

What needs to happen is when natural disasters happen, we need all the charities to come together and take action, along with the relevant governments that way we actually look after human life and provide for it.

PasturesNew

I'd get them all off/out.... if you look at the shape of the land and the way hurricanes move you think "look at that, I bet it was all one bit of land once, but there were HUGE storms".

Then you look at historical hurricane data going back thousands of years - and you realise that we're at the end of a "quiet period" and that before humans recently inhabited the islands it was a hell hole of MASSIVE hurricanes/similar.

In short .... it's livening up again on that route. I'd get them off.