Category: Industries

Mineral Extraction 101 – Raw Materials ==> Finished Goods

Posted on January 22, 2021 in Ethos, Industries, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

Thanks to the COVID-19 Global Pandemic, the tourism product in the Caribbean “is shot”. We must now look at an alternative. Any alternative?!

What else do we have to offer?

How about minerals?

Let’s get serious and “dig deep” as we take a hard look into these prospects.

Get it?! Minerals … dig … prospects, as in Gold Prospectors.  🙂

The movement behind the 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean engages in a Teaching Series every month to address issues germane to Caribbean life-culture, plus to message how to reform and transform the Caribbean economic engines. This month, due to COVID-19 lockdowns, this writer is quarantined in Nassau, Bahamas.

Here, during the peak of the Winter Tourist season. The problem though, is that there are NO Tourists this year.

The cupboards are bare!

Heaven help us… if we plan to build a future economy on this foundation.

The Go Lean movement wants to consider other types of economic activities to the Caribbean landscape; we urgently want to investigate the alternatives and there is a lot of talk about Mineral Extraction.

How viable is it?

Firstly, we need to accept, that despite the present impasse, the region’s economic driver is still tourism, or will be again after this pandemic is assuaged. Tourism and Mineral Extractions are incompatible activities.

Picture a spill from an oil well damaging the beaches at a resort.

Thus, there is the need for cautions in any considerations we make. Our challenge will be to embrace the commerce of Mineral Extraction for the positives, while avoiding the negatives.

This commentary posits that there are opportunities for the Caribbean to better explore Mineral Extractions, on land and in the seas. This commentary is the first, 1-of-6, for the January 2021 Teaching Series on Mineral Extractions 101. The full series is as follows:

  1. Mineral Extraction 101 – Raw Materials ==> Finished Goods
  2. Mineral Extraction 101 – Lessons from History: Jamaica’s Bauxite
  3. Mineral Extraction 101 – Industrial Reboot – Modern factories – Small footprints
  4. Mineral Extraction 101 – Commerce of the Seas – Encore
  5. Mineral Extraction 101 – Restoration after Extraction – Cool Sites
  6. Mineral Extraction 101 – Sovereign Wealth Fund – Not the Panacea

With the quest to investigate the ecosystems of Mineral Extraction, we have to take a “Full 360 View” and look at the past, present and the future.

Question: How far back do we need to look-view-consider? Answer: All the way to 1776.

See this quotation from a previous commentary (June 17, 2015) from the Go Lean movement:

1776 was a very good year…

… not just because the 13 original British colonies declared their independence as the United States of America, but also the publication of the landmark book on Economic Principles, An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations by Adam Smith, the 18th century Scottish political economics pioneer. The publication is cited as a reference source in the book Go Lean…Caribbean – a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) to elevate the economic, security and governing engines of the Caribbean region. A relevant quote from the Go Lean book follows (Page 67):

    … usually abbreviated as “The Wealth of Nations“, this book is considered the first modern work of economics, and [Smith] is thusly cited as the “father of modern economics”, even today, and among the most influential thinkers in the field of economics. Through reflection over the economics at the beginning of the Industrial Revolution the book touches upon broad topics as the division of labor, productivity and free markets.
    Smith attacked most forms of government interference in the economic process, including tariffs, arguing that these create inefficiency and high prices in the long run. It is believed that this theory, laissez-faire economic philosophy, influenced government legislation in later years.
    Smith advocated a government that was active in sectors other than the economy. He advocated public education for poor adults, a judiciary, and a standing army—institutional systems not directly profitable for private industries.
    The “Invisible Hand” is a frequently referenced theme from Smith’s book. He refers to “the support of domestic industry” and contrasts that support with the importation of goods. Neoclassical economic theory has expanded the metaphor beyond the domestic/foreign manufacture argument to encompass nearly all aspects of economics. The “invisible hand” of the market is a metaphor now to describe the self-regulating behavior of the marketplace. …

So Adam Smith’s 1776 book “The Wealth of the Nations” addresses how colonial powers were to optimize the national “Wealth”; optimizing the source extraction of minerals or raw materials and the refinement process in the host country for the Finished Goods.. A further quotation relates:

Smith notes that, curiously, interest rates in the colonies are also remarkably high ([previously], Smith described how wages in the colonies are higher than in England). Smith attributes this to the fact that, when an empire takes control of a colony, prices for a huge abundance of land and resources are extremely cheap. This allows capitalists to increase his profit, but simultaneously draws many capitalists to the colonies, increasing the wages of labour. As this is done, however, the profits of stock in the mother country rise (or at least cease to fall), as much of it has already flocked offshore. – Source: Wikipedia.

The foregoing quotations mention the principle of the Raw Materials eco-system: “importation of cheap goods from “remote” colonies … domestic manufacture”. Again, this is the overall strategy:

  • Extract the Raw Materials in the Colonies
  • Export it to the Empire’s Host Country
  • Import it and manufacture Finish Goods in the Host Country
  • Export Finish Goods to the rest of the world, including the territory for the originating raw materials.

Despite the 245 years since the publication of the landmark book by Adam Smith, the valuation remains. Raw Materials are cheap; Finished Goods are more valuable; the gap between the two is the inviting profit.

For all of you seeking to prioritize Mineral Extraction as an alternative to tourism, you need to be On Alert. This is the system that you will be challenging. Consider this actuality now of the low intrinsic value of Raw Materials -vs- the Finished Goods:

  • Sand ==> Cement
      
  • Bauxite ==> Aluminum
  • Iron Ore ==> Steel
  • Silica ==> Glass
  • Coffee Beans == Cappuccino / Macchiato
  • Wheat Grain ==> Bread
  • Barley Grain ==> Beer

This is Mineral Extraction 101, a consideration of the Basics of Raw Materials. Let’s explore this ecosystem further by reviewing these training VIDEO‘s for Kids:

VIDEO # 1 – Raw Materials Definition for Kids  – https://youtu.be/Ai0U1b2FlVw


History Illustrated
Posted Oct 5, 2014 – Free Activities and Downloads for Kids: http://historyillustrated.org/

———–

VIDEO # 2 – Manufactured Goods Definition for Kids  – https://youtu.be/BtKni7haXtQ


History Illustrated
Posted Oct 6, 2014 – Free Activities and Downloads for Kids: http://historyillustrated.org/

The reality is that prices for a huge abundance of land and resources were extremely cheap 250 years ago and is still cheap down. That orthodoxy that Adam Smith reported on in 1776 remains even today. This is NOT where the money is; the money or value proposition is associated with the manufacturing of the Raw Materials to produce the Finished Goods. If we want to reboot our economic landscape, we must position ourselves on the manufacturing side, not just the Raw Materials side. There is more profit following this strategy.

Profits ==> Jobs  ==> Entrepreneurial opportunities ==> Community Revitalization

We do indeed need to foster more Mineral Extractions. There are so many lessons that we can learn from the Economic History of other communities and their fostering of Raw Materials on the land and in the seas – think dredging operations.

According to the book Go Lean…Caribbean, ‘Luck is where opportunity meets preparation’ – Page 252.

Well, opportunity awaits the Caribbean … for Mineral Extractions, dredging operations and even oil exploration.

The Go Lean movement have consistently asserted that Mineral Extraction and Raw Materials – on land and sea – must be central to any industrial rebooting of the Caribbean region, despite all the drama associated with his subject. Consider this sample list of previous blog-commentaries:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18578 Missing Out on the ‘Rush’ – Encore
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13155 Industrial Reboot – Pipelines 101
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12230 Commerce of the Seas – Extraction Realities
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7384 Oil Refineries – Strategy for Advanced Economics
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5396 ‘Significant’ oil deposit found offshore Guyana
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4700 Rare Earths: The new ‘Rush’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3743 Trinidad cuts 2015 budget as oil prices tumble
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3213 The fluctuations of Oil Prices – Gas is NOT Greener with Extractions

In some tourism circles, there is the philosophy of “Leave Nothing and Take Nothing”. Where the tourists are asked to “leave nothing but footprints” and “take nothing but memories”. This is NOT true for Mineral Extractions or mining. The landscape or waterscape may be scared for all eternity, plus the actuality of water table contamination and other hazards. On land, some hills and/or mountains may be excavated and there may be extensive dredging in the seas, affecting coral reefs or surf patterns.

Recent studies of mining activities in countries around the world produced these sour assessments:

Title #1 – Kenya: Mining impact on communities’ livelihoods: A case study of Taita Taveta County, Kenya
Mining did not help some of the households, to acquire assets, even though it enhanced ability to meet their day to day needs. Mining pits, poor rehabilitation and large-scale mining have caused a loss of agricultural land resulting in reduced crop yields and poor living standards. Some established mining companies in the area did not compensate, or share their accrued revenues nor did they support development projects as was expected. Therefore, the improvement brought about by mining was not sustainable to communities’ livelihood. – Source

————-

Title #2 – Appalachia, United States: Toxic Waste and Mining
In Appalachia, mining companies literally blow the tops off mountains to reach thin seams of coal. They then dump millions of tons of rubble into the streams and valleys below the mining sites. Toxic heavy metals such as cadmium, selenium, and arsenic leach into local water supplies, poisoning drinking water.

This destructive practice, known as mountaintop-removal mining, sends carcinogenic toxins like silica into the air, affecting communities for miles around. Cancer rates are twice as high for people who live near mountaintop-removal sites, and the risk of heart defects in babies born to mothers who lived near these sites while pregnant is 181 percent higher than for babies in non-mining areas. It also destroys beautiful, biodiverse forests and wildlife habitat, increases the risk of flooding, and wipes out entire communities.

This practice has damaged or destroyed more than 2,000 miles of streams, and has wiped out more than 1.5 million acres of forests in Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia, and West Virginia. – Source

————-

So if the Caribbean stakeholders finally want to reboot their industrial landscape and diversify away from tourism-only, they must accept the heavy-lifting that comes with the challenge of Mineral Extractions; it is not a “slam dunk” easy industry, and it is rarely profitable.

The valuation of cheap raw materials lingers since pre-industrial colonial days.

Learning lessons from the past, and from other societies means that we must be prepared to employ the Best Practices in regulating this industry. The heavy-lifting tasks may be too big for any one member-state alone; there is the need to collaborate, cooperate and coordinate technocratic solutions for the entire region as a whole. This is the quest of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), to bring Good Governance to the region as a whole and the for all 30 Caribbean member-states individually.

The Go Lean roadmap calls for the confederate management of an expanded Exclusive Economic Zone for the Caribbean Sea.

This is how we can explore and exploit Mineral Extractions in the Caribbean and make our homeland a better place to live, work and play. This vision is conceivable, believable and achievable.  🙂

About the Book
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Who We Are
The movement behind the Go Lean book – a non-partisan, apolitical, religiously-neutral Community Development Foundation chartered for the purpose of empowering and re-booting economic engines – stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 11 – 13):

x. Whereas we are surrounded and allied to nations of larger proportions in land mass, populations, and treasuries, elements in their societies may have ill-intent in their pursuits, at the expense of the safety and security of our citizens. We must therefore appoint “new guards” to ensure our public safety and threats against our society, both domestic and foreign. …

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xii. Whereas the legacy in recent times in individual states may be that of ineffectual governance with no redress to higher authority, the accidence of this Federation will ensure accountability and escalation of human and civil rights of the people for good governance, justice assurances, due process and the rule of law. As such, any threats of a “failed state” status for any member state must enact emergency measures on behalf of the Federation to protect the human, civil and property rights of the citizens, residents, allies, trading partners, and visitors of the affected member state and the Federation as a whole.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accidence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

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How to fix the COVID economy?

Posted on January 10, 2021 in Ethos, Industries, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

To fix the economy, we have to fix the pandemic – President-Elect Joe Biden, as a candidate in September 2020.
See VIDEO in the Appendix below.

Unfortunately, the solution is not so simple … for the Caribbean communities. For the 30 member-states that constitute the political Caribbean, we have to do more than this 1 thing of fixing the pandemic in order to fix our economy. Our solution is more complicated. Plus even that 1 thing will not be so simple. (Many of our citizens refuse capitulation).

The Caribbean is different …

… than the American economy referred in the foregoing quotation. For one, we have a mono-industrial economy: Tourism. Yes, we have to mitigate the threats of Coronavirus, and then we also need to diversify from that mono-industrial reality. The defect of a touristic industrial footprint is characterized by the actuality of being nothing more than parasites to some host economy. Who is the host?

The same United States of America that now President-Elect Joe Biden was seeking to preside over. So at this juncture, we cannot recover our Caribbean economy until America recovers theirs.

That will not be so simple, even after remediating the contagious disease threat of the pandemic, communities will have to deal with the economic fallout from the pandemic for a long time, maybe even decades. See this assertion from the globally praised Business news magazine The Economist in an October 23, 2020 story here:

VIDEO – Covid-19: how to fix the economy | The Economist – https://youtu.be/p0tCPwyJ6JI

The Economist
Posted October 23, 2020 – Governments will have to deal with the economic fallout from the pandemic for decades to come. If they get their response wrong, countries risk economic stagnation and political division. Read more here: https://econ.st/3ojORKY

Find The Economist’s most recent coverage of covid-19 here: https://econ.st/3m212Kj

Read our special report on the economic impact of the COVID-19 pandemic: https://econ.st/37mGlos

How the pandemic is reshaping banking: https://econ.st/3kj1qnq

Why America’s economy is beating forecasts: https://econ.st/3kdzDEK

How the covid-19 pandemic is forcing a rethink in economic policy-making: https://econ.st/2IIhX69

How recessions create long-term psychological and economic scars: https://econ.st/3o55XvH

What past pandemics can teach us about the economic effects of pandemics: https://econ.st/37mzwmy

———

Related:  https://youtu.be/KJhlo6DtJIk

This foregoing VIDEO identified the threats against the orthodox American economy as being the following:

  • Digital Economy,
  • Actuality of trade with China, and
  • Repercussions from the recent 2008 Financial Crisis; preponderance for austerities.

Before the Coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic, the Caribbean was also mired deep in chaos from these three factors. Once the pandemic challenges are remediated we still have to re-focus and address these issues. So we had chaos before, and now we have new chaos. We so badly need to reboot our economy to be chaos-free once and for all.

This was the quest of the 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean. It identified the same 3 threats as (and more like Climate Change); see here:

  • Technology – falling behind with the adoption of Internet Communications Technologies.
  • Globalization – we only consume, not produce, so we are shifted hither-and-thither by bigger economies.
  • 2008 Consequences – access to foreign capital (think: US Dollars) make or break our local economies

So in retrospect, the Go Lean book, serving as a roadmap for the introduction of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), identified solutions for fixing the Caribbean economy as of 2003, like a more diversified economy. Had the CU been introduced and implemented then, the chaos that we had just before the pandemic would have been remediated by now.

The Go Lean book says in its opening foreword:

Many people love their homelands and yet still begrudgingly leave; this is due mainly to the lack of economic opportunities. The Caribbean has tried, strenuously, over the decades, to diversify their economy away from the mono-industrial trappings of tourism, and yet tourism is still the primary driver of the economy. Prudence dictates that the Caribbean nations expand and optimize their tourism products, but also look for other opportunities for economic expansion. The requisite investment of the resources (time, talent, treasuries) for this goal may be too big for any one Caribbean member-state. Rather, shifting the responsibility to a region-wide, professionally-managed, deputized technocracy will result in greater production and greater accountability. This deputized agency is the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). This book advocates that all Caribbean member-states (independent & dependent) lean-in to this plan for confederacy, collaboration and convention.

The chaos of today’s pandemic would have been lessened too, under a CU regime, as the Go Lean roadmap calls for the appropriate strategies, tactics and implementations to assuage the threats of epidemics and pandemics. This was related in a previous blog-commentary from March 24, 2015; see this excerpt here:

A Lesson in History – SARS in Hong Kong
The CU is not designed to just be in some advisory role when it comes to pandemic crises, but rather to possess the authority to act as a Security Apparatus for the region’s Greater Good. This is the mandate as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Page 11) related to climate change, but it applies equally to pandemics, to …

    “protect the entire region it is necessary to prepare to insure the safety and security of life, property and systems of commerce in our geographical region. As nature recognizes no borders in the target of its destruction, we also must set aside border considerations in the preparation and response to these … challenges”.

Legally, each Caribbean member-state would ratify a Status of Forces Agreement that would authorize this role for the CU agencies (Emergency Management and Disease Control & Management) to serve as a proxy and deputy of the Public Health administrations for each member-state. This would thusly empower these CU agencies to quarantine and detain citizens with probable cause of an infectious disease. The transparency, accountability and chain-of-command would be intact with the appropriate checks-and-balances of the CU’s legislative and judicial oversight. This is a lesson learned from Hong Kong 2003 with China’s belligerence.

This is how we could have fixed the Caribbean economy for this 2020’s decade. It is not just a simple one or two tasks; no, it is a long list of heavy-duty tactics and tasks; (in fact the Go Lean book identifies 144 different advocacies).  This theme, rebooting the economic engines of the Caribbean member-states, aligns with many previous commentaries from the Go Lean movement; see a sample list here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20571 Banking on the Inter-American Development Bank for crisis funding
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19741 Keep the Change: Mono-Industrial Economy Exhaustion
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19572 MasterClass: Economics and Society
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19568 Big Hairy Audacious Goal – Need ‘Big Brother’ for Pandemics
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19452 BHAG – Regional Currency – ‘In God We Trust’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18566 Reviewing How an Impactful Bank Can Change an Economy
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18524 One Step Closer to transforming local economies: e-Money Solutions
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=17337 Industrial Reboots – A 18-part Series on diversification
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=360 Central Banks Can Create Money from ‘Thin Air’ – Here’s How

How to fix the COVID economy for the Caribbean member-states?

We still need to reboot or change the industrial landscape!

We always did! Now we are at the precipice; we have no choice but to change.

The pandemic will pass. There are vaccines available now. As depicted in this excerpt from a previous blog-commentary from August 29, 2020:

Pandemic Playbook – COVID Vaccine: To Be or Not To Be
The world is enduring the Coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic crisis; it is wreaking havoc on the world’s economic engines – $250 Billion a day in losses – and Public Health deliveries. The only hope is a vaccine, of which there are a number of them in development [distribution]. …

Don’t get it twisted! The Caribbean member-states boast a Service industrial economy – tourism. To participate in this industry space will require compliance. Tourists – by air for resort-based stay-overs or cruise line passengers – will not want to expose themselves to possible infections.

Lastly, individuals can simply chose to exit societal functioning – a self-imposed quarantine; think: Leper Colony. These ones will have to take a seat – with a view – and watch life pass them by.

Do we then need to embrace some austerity measures so as to transform our Red Ink into Black”? Please God, No!

As depicted in this excerpt from a previous blog-commentary from July 7, 2016:

A Lesson in Economic Fallacies – Austerity: Dangerous Idea?
Those who advocate to remediate Caribbean economics needs to avoid a series of Economic Fallacies. …

One common remediation for economic crisis has been Austerity. What is Austerity? And is this a good thing or bad thing? First, the dictionary definition is: “reduced availability of luxuries and consumer goods, as brought about by government policy”. …

“Austerity is a very dangerous idea. First of all, it doesn’t work. As the past four years and countless historical examples from the last 100 years show, while it makes sense for any one state to try and cut its way to growth, it simply cannot work when all states try it simultaneously: all we do is shrink the economy. In the worst case, austerity policies worsened the Great Depression and created the conditions for seizures of power by the forces responsible for the Second World War: the Nazis and the Japanese military establishment.” …

What exactly is the Go Lean plan to counter the economic fallacy of austerity?

Economic growth …
… as in creating jobs through industrial and entrepreneurial endeavors – for a grand total of 2.2 million new jobs.

So how will we fix the economy for the Caribbean member-states after this COVID crisis?

We must now do the things that we should have been doing all the while. Consider:

  • We must reboot the economic engines;
  • Confederate the regional economy into a Single Market;
  • Diversify the industrial landscape;
  • Create new jobs in new industries;
  • Lean-in to the strategies, tactics and implementations of the Go Lean roadmap.

Are we Ready? Are you Ready?

It is past time that we do the heavy-lifting to make our homeland a better place to live, work and play. Let’s get busy! We have planned the work; now we need to work the plan.  🙂

About the Book
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) and the Caribbean Central Bank (CCB), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Who We Are
The movement behind the Go Lean book – a non-partisan, apolitical, religiously-neutral Community Development Foundation chartered for the purpose of empowering and re-booting economic engines – stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 12 – 13):

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

———–

Appendix VIDEO – Can’t fix the economy until you fix the pandemic –  https://fb.watch/2WWGfEn_Bs/ 


CBS Evening News with Norah O’Donnell

Posted September 29, 2020 – “You can’t fix the economy until you fix the COVID-19 crisis,” Joe Biden says of job losses during the pandemic, “and he has no intention of doing anything about making it better for you all at home in terms of your health and your safety.”

LIVE: https://cbsn.ws/33c1tv4

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Butch Stewart – A Full Caribbean Life, RIP

Posted on January 5, 2021 in Ethos, Industries, Locations, Social

Go Lean Commentary

Gordon “Butch” Stewart has died.  🙁

This is a sad day for his family and all of the Caribbean. He was a renowned entrepreneur for the regional travel industry, a hotelier – think Sandals, Beaches and others; see Appendix VIDEO – and the one-time owner of the airline Air Jamaica, now branded “Caribbean Airlines”. (The airline was sold back to the Jamaican Government in 2004.[16])

See this published obituary from a local Caribbean media outlet (Bahamas):

Title: ‘Entrepreneur, statesman, dreamer’: Sandals founder Gordon ‘Butch’ Stewart dies at 79  
By: Ava Turnquest 
NASSAU, BAHAMAS — Jamaican hotelier and business mogul Gordon ‘Butch’ Stewart died in hospital yesterday.

Stewart, the founder of Sandals Resorts International, ATL Group, and The Jamaica Observer, died at 79.

His death was confirmed in an internal memorandum issued to managers of the Sandals group by his son, Sandals deputy chairman Adam Stewart.

Adam Stewart acknowledged the death seemed unbelievable, noting his father chose to keep a very recent health diagnosis private.

He said his father will be missed forever.

“The Hon. Gordon ‘Butch’ Stewart OJ, a distinction he was so proud of, was a gifted entrepreneur,” Stewart said.

“He was a marketing genius and talented showman, but those who knew him best recognized that he was a dreamer who could dream bigger and better than anyone. It was often said: “the best thing for people around him to do is be dream catchers.”

Stewart continued: “That’s why he always credited his success to the incredible team around him, why he listened intently when it came to creating innovative things that would excite and delight our guests, and why it is so important that I remind you today of all days, that we will all continue to be his dream catchers.

“Together, we have all been part of something bigger than ourselves, led by a man who believed in us and who gave us opportunities to learn, grow and the tools to make dreams real.”

Stewart said: “For him and because of him ̧ we will continue to dream big and deliver on his certainty that true luxury is always best enjoyed by the sea. My Dad lived a big life – husband, father, grandfather, great grandfather entrepreneur, statesman, dreamer.”

“A singular personality and an unstoppable force who revelled in defying the odds, exceeding expectations and whose passion for his family was matched only by the people and possibility of the Caribbean, for whom he was a fierce champion.

“There will never be another quite like him and we will miss him forever,” he added.

Source: Posted and retrieved January 5, 2021 from: https://ewnews.com/entrepreneur-statesman-dreamer-sandals-founder-gordon-butch-stewart-dies-at-79.

Butch Stewart definitely had an impact on the Caribbean ecosystem. As of 2012, Stewart’s businesses employed more than 10,000 people in the Caribbean across various industries including hospitality, restaurant, automotive, retail, and media.[9]

Butch Stewart labored to promote, provide and protect Caribbean interest all over the world. He proved to be a fine role model for the Caribbean youth to emulate. In fact, his profile was featured in the 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean – on Page 189 – this publication serves as a roadmap for rebooting the Caribbean societal engines of economics, security and governance. See that published profile in the Appendix below.

We can look back at Butch Stewart’s life and see how to prosper where planted.

His easy pace, infectious warmth and trademark striped shirt, belied the prowess and acute business acumen responsible for his estimated billion-dollar, privately-owned Jamaican-based empire that includes 24 Caribbean properties, Appliance Traders, ATL Automotive, ATL Autobahn and the Observer media company.

All told, Stewart spearheaded two dozen diverse companies that collectively represent the largest private sector group in Jamaica, the country’s biggest foreign exchange earner and its largest non-government employer. – Source: Retrieved January 5, 2021 from: https://www.breakingtravelnews.com/focus/article/breaking-travel-news-investigates-gordon-butch-stewart/

With Sir Richard Branson

With Sir Richard Branson

He was a mover-and-a-shaker; we need many more Caribbean people – in the homeland and the Diaspora – to follow in those footsteps. This is even a Biblical precept; see here:

Remember those who led you … and considering the result of their way of life, imitate their faith. – The Bible: Hebrews 13:7 New American Standard Bible

The globe is mourning his passing, not as a Global Citizen, but rather as a Caribbean “Man of Distinction”. That labeling “Man of Distinction” is not our wording alone, but the array of organizations that honored him during his life. See this sample here:

Honours and awards
Stewart received several accolades and awards including Jamaica’s highest national distinctions: Order of Jamaica, and Commander of the Order of Distinction.[29] He received honorary Doctor of Laws degrees from the University of the West Indies (2001) and from the University of Technology, Jamaica (2009). He also received an honorary Doctor of Business Administration degree from Johnson & Wales University in 2011.[30]

In 1992, Stewart was presented with the Dr Martin Luther King Jr Humanitarian Award from the Jamaica–America Society.[29] Ernst & Young voted him Master Entrepreneur of the decade of the 90s. Stewart was a Paul Harris Fellow, Rotary International‘s highest award. At the 2000 World Travel Awards, he was voted “Travel Man of the Millennium” for his work in promoting Caribbean tourism. In 2011, The Caribbean American Foundation presented Stewart with the Golden Eagle Humanitarian Award in recognition of his philanthropic contributions to education and entrepreneurship in the Caribbean. In 2014 Stewart was honored with the Most Innovative All-Inclusive Resort Executive by the Travalliance Travvy Awards, Hotelier of the Year at the Cacique Award held by the Bahamas Ministry of Tourism and Aviation and the Invest Caribbean Now Leadership Award presented at its global summit.[31]

Stewart was a recipient of Caribbean World Magazine’s Lifetime Achievement Award for his work in Jamaica,[32] and was referred to as one of Jamaica’s most-admired businessmen by Kamal King, President of Cambridge College and Community Services Jamaica, in an address to graduating students.[33][34]

He earned Lifetime Achievement Awards from The American Academy of Hospitality Sciences, Travel Weekly and Globe Travel Awards.[35] – Source: Wikipedia.

This commentary is NOT in the business of doing one obituary after another. But we do identify, qualify and analyze the life and legacy of people who have had a major impact on Caribbean life and image. While we cannot bring back the dead, no one can, we can benefit by studying their words and actions. We can imitate their faith. This is a familiar theme in previous commentaries that we have published that have been dubbed obituaries. See this sample list here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=21038 David Dinkins – Former Mayor of NYC and hero to Caribbean Diaspora
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19180 RIP Katherine Johnson – STEM Forerunner & Rocket Scientist
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=10114 Caribbean Roots: Actress Esther Rolle from TV Show ‘Good Times’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=10015 E. R. Braithwaite, Author of ‘To Sir, With Love’ – RIP
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=8165 Role Model Muhammad Ali’s Greatest Fight – RIP
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2726 Caribbean Role Model – Oscar De La Renta – RIP

Butch Stewart was a Jamaican, not American, Canadian or UK citizen. He was a Caribbean man that lived a full Caribbean life.

There is a familiar Meme – picture or phrase that a lot of people share with each other – in the Bahamas:

This actuality depicts our quest for the Caribbean: to optimize the societal engines so that we can all spend our days in the homeland, cradle to grave, with not sacrifice as to the quality of life. To accomplish this, we need some help, thusly, we introduced the concept of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) to do the heavy-lifting for executing strategies, tactics and implementations that would elevate the entire Caribbean region.

  • For those people in the Caribbean homeland, we entreat you: Stay Home, help is on the way.
  • For those in the Diaspora, we urge you to come in from the cold. Your homeland awaits you.

Take your rest Gordon “Butch” Stewart; you have lived a full Caribbean life and you have shown us how to “prosper where we are planted” here in the Caribbean. RIP …

Yes, we can all prosper in the homeland. Let’s get busy and do the work, the heavy-lifting, to make our Caribbean homeland a better place to live, work and play. 🙁

About the Book
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Who We Are
The movement behind the Go Lean book – a non-partisan, apolitical, religiously-neutral Community Development Foundation chartered for the purpose of empowering and re-booting economic engines – stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 12 – 13):

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

—————-

Excerpt: Anecdote # 18 – Caribbean Industrialist: Gordon “Butch” Stewart (Go Lean book Page 189)

Title: How I Did It: Butch Stewart of Sandals Resorts | Inc.com
By: Stephanie Clifford – (excerpt from) INC. Magazine – April 1, 2008
Gordon “Butch” Stewart’s voice is deep and slow, and he speaks with melodic phrasing, suggesting the sun-soaked climate of his native Jamaica, where he started Sandals Resorts, in 1981. Today (2008), Stewart owns and runs 20 resorts under the Sandals umbrella, including the original Sandals all-inclusive, couples-only resorts, the Beaches resorts for families, and four boutique hotels. Stewart serves as company chairman, while his son Adam, 27, is now the CEO. The resorts are sprawling, with flourishes like multicolored pagodas, swim-up bars, and poolside Greek temples. One resort boasts 100 separate swimming pools. From its small beginnings, Sandals, based in Montego Bay, has grown into a multibillion-dollar company.

I got a job at a trading company and was in charge of the appliance department. After five years, I was able to save over $3,000. [Starting in 1968, I realized that] Fedders air conditioners were not represented in Jamaica. I bought an airplane ticket and I headed to Edison, New Jersey. I met with the president’s nephew. We really hit it off. He said to the finance people, “Look, he’s paying cash for the first shipment, so there’s nothing to lose; give him a chance.”

I rented an old doctor’s office in Jamaica, a secondhand car, and a secondhand pickup. I was able to buy 27 room air conditioners. Before they arrived, I had them sold. I would install them in half a day, and so we made our money out of making people happy. Today, that company, ATL Group, is also in the office equipment business, we are the distributor for Honda motorcars, and we have a newspaper called The Jamaica Observer.

Jamaica had gone through a period of upheaval in the ’70s. It was a time of radical socialism, and the economy went to tatters. But we survived, and in 1980 we had a new government. We were so enthusiastic. I ended up buying two hotels. They were all in shambles. If I had known what I was doing, I would never have bought those hotels. The amount of Pandora’s boxes that were in there! We had to find out how to market and how to cook the food, and the kind of décor and rooms people wanted. That was 1981.

We set about trying to provide more than people expected. I was in Italy and I saw this hair dryer in the bedroom. I found out the manufacturer, and we were the first hotel to have hair dryers in the Caribbean. It’s not a big deal today, but in 1983, it was. We did our first swim-up pool bar in 1984. We were the first in the Caribbean to do it. When we were putting in our first hot tub, the people in the hotel association said, “Butch, take it easy, man, you don’t need to waste your money that way.” While they were talking, I was building a second and a third in different parts of the property, because I realized people like different locations to soak in the tub.

Everybody thought we’d be out of business the first month because the hotel is very close to the airport. We came up with the idea of everyone waving to the people that were leaving in the plane, and kissing the one you love when a plane flies by. I don’t think we had five complaints after that. Then the Concorde started flying to Jamaica once a week, and it made more noise than any airplane I’ve ever heard. The buildings shook. So we turned all the beach lounges to face the airport, and that magnificent airplane would get up right in front of everybody on the beach. Guests would come rushing in: “Has the Concorde taken off yet?” We made a promotion out of it.

The first two years, we lost more money than I ever dreamt possible. We realized that we didn’t have enough bedrooms. We only had 100 rooms, so I went in and built more rooms, and that same hotel now is 251 bedrooms.

In 1986, we were able to buy another hotel, Sandals Royal Caribbean it’s called today. And we’ve been able to build more. One is Sandals Grande Riviera Beach & Villa Resort, in the area where I grew up; in fact, the piano bar is built right where my grandmother’s home was. Sandals Negril ended up being the most successful hotel that the Caribbean has ever had. We opened it in November 1988. It opened full, and it has been full ever since.

Beaches came straight out of guests saying to me, “Butch, we have been here 15 times, 20 times. But now we have kids; we need a place that we can take the whole family.” So that’s how Beaches evolved, starting in 1997. We never realized that you needed to do so much to keep the entire family happy. Kids get bored if you don’t have organized things for them to do. The smartest thing I ever did was to make my second-youngest son, Adam, chairman of the youth committee to come up with creative ideas to make the younger people happy. We have water slides, swimming bars for kids — so it’s only juice and nonalcoholic drinks — and we have a little disco that converts into a movie theater.

We have spent $370 million over the past three years modernizing, redecorating, and expanding. Women — I mean, I hope I’m not saying something wrong — but women just want bigger and better-quality bathrooms every year. They want bathrooms that are like palaces, that have Jacuzzis in them, separate showers, bidets, twin basins, and now they want those big overhead showers, also soaking tubs. And our job is to please those requests.

…

I’ve never had any doubts about the business. I run on gut instinct to a large extent, but at the same time I never make a major decision without bouncing it off of a circle of people that I work with. Right now, we have an organization that has everybody in it. You want lawyers; we have them. Engineers; we have them. Accountants; we have them. Marketing people; we have them. People that understand how to cook the best food in the world; we have them.

Source: Retrieved November 2013 from: http://www.inc.com/magazine/20080401/how-i-did-it-butch-stewart-sandals-resorts.html

—————-

Appendix VIDEO – The BEST SANDALS Resorts-The Pros & Cons of Each … – https://youtu.be/M39FJAHUlBk

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I hope you have a wonderful, blessed day. I will see you in my next video! – Vanessa

Sandals has many incredible resorts, but we’re going to give you the Pros AND Cons of our favorites, and which one we picked and enjoyed on our Honeymoon! – Vanessa

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Hello Travel Insurance – No Longer Optional

Posted on November 27, 2020 in Ethos, Government, Industries, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

The actuality of 2020 has changed the world. Period.

Many of the changes have been bad; but there are some that are shaping up to be good. One such is the emergence of Travel Insurance as a necessary product for visitors to the different Caribbean member-states (islands and coastal countries). Imagine a tourist contracting Coronavirus COVID-19 while vacationing in the Caribbean. How would that complicated situation be managed … and paid for?

The need for Travel Insurance is indisputable.

What exactly is Travel Insurance?

Travel insurance is an insurance product for covering unforeseen losses incurred while travelling, either internationally or domestically. Basic policies generally only cover emergency medical expenses while overseas, while comprehensive policies typically include coverage for trip cancellation, lost luggage, flight delays, public liability, and other expenses.[1]

Cost calculation
Travel insurance, are risk-based, and take into account a range of factors to determine whether a traveller can purchase a policy and what the premium will be. This generally includes destination countries or regions, the duration of the trip, the age of the travellers, and any optional benefits that they require coverage for such as pre-existing medical conditions, adventure sports, rental vehicle excess, cruising, or high-value electronics.[2] Some policies will also take into account the traveller’s estimated value of their trip to determine price. …

Journey departure and return conditions
Most travel insurance policies must be purchased prior to departure from home, or from the first departure point (e.g. an airport), depending on the product….

Complimentary travel insurance
Some credit card issuers offer automatic travel insurance if travel arrangements are paid for using their credit cards, but these policies are generic and do not take into account personal requirements and circumstances.[5]

Common benefits
Medical
In the event of minor injury or illness overseas, medical benefits offer coverage for visits to general practitioners, medicine, ambulance fees, and limited dentistry benefits. In the event of hospitalisation, most travel insurance policies include emergency assistance services, which can offer guarantees of payment to hospitals for treatment, liaise treating doctors, and organise transfers between hospitals or medical evacuations back to the insured person’s country of origin.[6] More comprehensive policies include an emergency companion cover, so that a family member can remain with the insured person while in hospital.

In the event of death overseas, medical benefit sections typically include cover for repatriation of remains to insured person’s the country of origin, or a funeral overseas.
…
Compulsory travel insurance
Certain countries require foreign visitors have proof of sufficient travel insurance as a condition for granting a visa or of approving visa-free entry. This includes travellers applying for a Schengen Area or UAE visa, and all visitors to Cuba, Turkey and Belarus.[21] Thailand[22] and Egypt[23] have announced plans to introduce similar requirements. Tour companies and cruise providers may also require passengers possess a minimum level of travel insurance before the traveller can commence their journey. – Source: Retrieved November 28, 2020 from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Travel_insurance.

As related here in the foregoing, some countries have mandated Travel Insurance; we see now that a number of Caribbean member-states have followed suit, as a mitigating strategy to the actualities of the Coronavirus COVID-19 pandemic. See here, the details for Jamaica and the Bahamas:

Title 1: “This must become international”: Jamaica launches mandatory protection program
By: Cindy Sosroutomo
KINGSTON, JAMAICA — Jamaica has announced a groundbreaking – and mandatory – new program for all foreign travellers, effective next month [November 2020].

Jamaica Cares, a joint collaboration between the Global Tourism Resilience & Crisis Management Centre (GTRCMC), the Global Travel and Tourism Resilience Council, and Global Rescue, is being hailed as a first-of-its kind traveller protection and emergency services program designed to protect both visitors and the people of Jamaica.

For approximately US$40, the end-to-end program provides all nationalities who are entering Jamaica with non-Jamaica passports with access to compulsory traveller protection and emergency medical services. It is comprised of two major components:

  • All Hazards program: Case management, transport logistics, field rescue, evacuation, and repatriation for medical emergencies, including COVID-19 and other crises up to and including natural disasters
  • COVID-19-specific program: International health coverage up to US$100,000 for visitors traveling to and from Jamaica, and on-island health coverage up to US$50,000

In a virtual press conference earlier this morning, Dan Richards, CEO of Global Rescue, confirmed that the fee will go towards supporting its new Jamaica Operations Centre (JOC) based in Montego Bay, and additional expansion to other locations as necessary.

“The JOC will ensure a rapid boots-on-the-ground response capability for dealing with crises when they occur, including coordinating our COVID-19 response in Jamaica and the region,” said Richards. “We envision head count to grow as we grow out the program to Jamaica and, ultimately, throughout the region and potentially the world.

“We will not rest until we have accomplished our mission, and that is the restoration of Jamaican travel and tourism to pre-COVID-19 levels and ongoing support thereafter.”

Jamaica’s Minister of Tourism, Edmund Bartlett, stressed the need for a proactive approach to global tourism recovery, saying that “destination assurance” is becoming a critical pre-condition for travel today.

“Trust has to be earned, we can only do that with action – not just words – through innovation, partnership and empathy,” said Bartlett. “As thought leaders, Jamaica has proactively taken a vital role in recovering and building the spirit of travel by restoring the trust and confidence of travellers in our destination. Jamaica Cares represents another prong in our COVID resilience and has been designed very specifically and deliberately. The program’s protocols will ensure our ability to welcome travellers to Jamaica safely.”

Bartlett expects the program to be implemented by U.S. thanksgiving, and confirms that Jamaica has already begun speaking with other countries that wish to follow suit. More information regarding how travellers can access the program and when payment will be required will come in the next few weeks, though Bartlett said that “the market will be given enough time to be able to respond to whatever the requirements are to comply.”

For travellers who already have travel insurance in place, Richards said that Jamaica Cares is an additive program.

“The extent that the individual already has a mechanism in place, either a service provider or a travel insurance package that they’ve already purchased, our personnel will work with whatever insurance they have to deconflict that program with ours and to make sure the delivery of services is seamless,” said Richards. “At the end of the day, what we are aiming for is that seamless delivery of service with respect to these types of issues.”

Also joining the press conference was Gloria Guevara, president & CEO of the World Travel & Tourism Council (WTTC), and Dr. Taleb Rifai, Co-Chair of the GTRCMC and the Global Travel and Tourism Resilience Council, and former Secretary-General of the United Nations’ World Tourism Organization (WTO).

Guevara stressed the need for the global community to eliminate quarantines so that “people can freely move around”, and said that today’s announcement is an important step towards resuming international travel.

“From WTTC, we believe that we have to learn how to co-exist with this virus, and we cannot wait for a vaccine to be ready and be deployed around the world,” she said. “We see Jamaica Cares as a very important initiative that will be a good example around the world and will hopefully be replicated by other countries.”

Rifai also hailed the program, calling it a great initiative between the public and private sectors.

“Now it’s in the hands of governments,” he said. “This concept must become international and we must have most governments adhere to it. It’s the only way we can travel safely and have peace of mind.”

Source: Posted Monday, October 26, 2020; retrieved November 15, 2020 from: https://www.travelweek.ca/news/this-concept-must-become-international-jamaica-launches-mandatory-protection-program/

———-

Title 2: Travel Insurance for the Bahamas
Sub-title: Do I Need Travel Insurance for the Bahamas?

“Bermuda, Bahama, come on pretty mama…” It’s no surprise the 1988 Beach Boys hit “Kokomo” features the Bahamas so prominently. Even today, the island getaway remains one of the most popular vacation destinations among travelers.

In light of recent hurricane activity in the area and COVID-19 pandemic, our customers are increasingly asking if travel insurance is required for trips to the Bahamas. As of November 14, 2020, travel health insurance is required for all incoming visitors. The cost for the mandatory insurance is included in the price of the Travel Health Visa that all tourists are required to apply for before entry. Travelers should keep in mind that this required coverage may be limited, so we recommend purchasing additional coverage to cover non-health-related expenses, like travel delays or baggage loss, for example.

Concerns about illness, injuries, and medical issues have historically been the top reasons those traveling to the Bahamas ask about insurance. However, the destruction caused by Hurricane Dorian has changed the way people are thinking about coverage for the islands. Weather is now the number one concern driving Bahamas trip insurance inquiries. Unforeseen weather events can wreak havoc on travel plans by causing delays, cancellations, and even total destruction of your accommodations in some cases. Choosing an insurance plan that will cover these types of events is your best defense.

As mentioned above, many travelers to the Bahamas buy coverage to supplement or replace their domestic health insurance while they’re away. Most domestic health insurance providers do not provide coverage while you are out of the country. For this reason, those taking a trip to the Bahamas frequently purchase travel medical plans. This way, they can stay protected against hefty out-of-pocket costs as a result of unforeseen illnesses or injuries.

While healthcare and weather concerns are the main reasons travelers purchase trip insurance for the Bahamas, there are additional reasons worth considering. For example, the Bahamas is a popular destination among cruisers, so you might consider choosing a plan that incorporates cruise coverage if you plan to set sail. Other travelers may be flying internationally to reach the islands. In these cases, flight insurance can help travelers with unexpected issues, including delays, interruptions, and missed connections.

Many comprehensive travel insurance plans include specialized coverages, like baggage delay or loss, emergency medical evacuation, or dental care while abroad. It’s important to think about which coverages make sense for your Bahamian vacation or business trip before choosing a plan.

How Much is Travel Insurance for the Bahamas?
One of the most common questions we get from customers planning a visit to the Bahamas is “how much travel insurance will cost?” The cost of the required travel insurance is now included in the Bahamas Travel Health Visa. However, the cost of a plan with additional coverage varies due to several factors. First, the number of travelers in the group may affect the rate. In general, policies that cover more than one traveler have an increased cost. Second, traveler ages can play a role in determining pricing, as older travelers typically carry more risk as a result of medical concerns. This increased risk can translate to a higher cost, especially if one or more travelers in the group have any pre-existing conditions. Another important factor is the duration of your trip. Traveling for a longer period of time usually means there are more opportunities for travel hiccups. So, a plan that covers a week-long trip or vacation will be considerably cheaper than a plan that covers long-term travel. One of the most significant factors for determining the cost of travel insurance is the kind of coverage the plan offers. Typically, the price of a plan will increase for each coverage it includes.

Source: Retrieved November 16, 2020 from: https://www.insuremytrip.com/destinations/bahamas-travel-insurance/

The “pangs of distress” of this pandemic rages on. Leave well enough alone and “things go to hell”: residents and citizens alike end up in the Emergency Room and the ICU. There is the need for therapeutics, oxygen, breathing aids, ventilators and even lung transplants.

Leave well enough alone and things go from worse to worst.

We must act … before, during and after affliction. Travel Insurance is a good Way Forward. See the documented experiences of a Frequent Traveller-Couple in the Appendix VIDEO below.

Change is afoot! There is still the need for touristic hospitality while pragmatically addressing the real risk of this pandemic.

Expect more Caribbean member-states and cruise lines to follow this model, individually. How about collectively? Is there a need for a regional coordination of tourism activities and risk management?

Yes, indeed …

We needed this construct before COVID-19 … and we will need it after COVID-19. We simply need a strong regional foundation for economics, security (Public Safety) and governance, This has been the assertion since the publication of the 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean. The 30 member-states of the region must collaborate, consolidate and confederate their tourism promotion and protection operations. This collectivity will create leverage across the entire regional base.

The Go Lean book serves as a roadmap for that regional construct: the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) and the Caribbean Central Bank (CCB). So why not also a locally-regionally owned insurance carrier; maybe even a CU/CCB subsidiary. We should be able to keep the profits here at home.

In a previous Go Lean commentary, from June 16, 2018, it was related how …

“the world is telling the Caribbean: Better band together to assuage your challenges. We are united in affliction, we might as well be united in solutions. Yes, it is no longer optional for our region to confederate as a Single Market.”

Confederation is not a bad thing! In a different previous blog-commentary from December 7, 2017, it was asserted that our Caribbean member-states all suffer from the same inadequate infrastructure, and thusly need to benefit from regional empowerments. Yes, the effect of regional integration could even be an Increased Caribbean Tourism Market Share. That commentary quoted:

It’s time to take inventory of Caribbean tourism:

      1. It has been found wanting! …
      It has been weighed in the balance; it has been measured …

Tourism is the current dominant industry; the goal is to “stand on the shoulders” of previous accomplishments, add infrastructure not possible by just one member-state alone and then reap the benefits. Imagine this manifestation in just this one new strategy: inter-island ferries that connect all islands for people, cars and goods.

The movement behind the book Go Lean … Caribbean seeks to reboot the economic engines of the Caribbean member-states. So while tourism is the region’s primary economic driver, it is inadequate for providing the needs of the people in the region, and inadequate for dealing with the crisis of pandemics. We must do better!

The likelihood of more pandemics/epidemics in the Caribbean is great. We have already had to contend with:

The Go Lean book explains further that the Caribbean region must install a security apparatus to prepare the economic engines, with the directive to prepare and respond to pandemic and natural disasters. The efficiency and effectiveness of a Caribbean Emergency Management Agency must be streamlined to ensure the world that there is business continuity of our systems of commerce. This quotation is derived from the Go Lean book at Page 184:

Modeled after FEMA in the US, this agency will be charged with the preparation, response and reconstruction for the regions for the eventual manifestations of hurricanes, earthquakes, tsunamis, flooding and other declared disasters, natural and man-made like medical epidemic, drought, pollution, oil spills, terrorism, etc.

This is what it means to be a technocracy, to promote the arts and sciences of Professional Emergency Management; as explained further at Page 64:

The CU treaty calls for a collective security agreement for the Caribbean member-states to prepare-respond to natural disasters, emergency incidents and assuage against systemic threats against the homeland. The CU employs the professional arts and sciences of Emergency Management to spread the costs and risks across the entire region. Outside of hurricanes or earthquakes, the emergency scope includes medical trauma, pandemic incidents and industrial accidents (i.e. oil or chemical spills) – any scenario that can impact the continuity of the economic engines and/or community.

This commentary describes the dynamics of a regional tourism promotion and protection. Yes, managing regional tourism means optimizing the planning and response for pandemics and natural disasters. As we have asserted time and again, this is no longer optional for this Caribbean region. We must now invest in the earnest effort for integration and collaboration. We must have the leverage to spread the costs, risks and premium base across the entire Caribbean region. Only then will the rest of the world know that a trip to the Caribbean is safe, risk-free and rewarding.

The Go Lean movement has previously detailed many related issues and advocacies for regional tourism management. Consider this sample of previous blog-commentaries:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20561 Toxic Environment – Opposite of ‘Diversity & Inclusion’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19409 Coronavirus: ‘Clear and Present’ Threat to Economic Security
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19217 ‘Live and Let Live’ – Allowing some Localism for Touristic Administrations
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18831 Opportunity: Supply Cruise Line with their Food needs
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=17919 ‘Be our Guest’ – But the Rules of Hospitality damage Societal Ethics
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=17072 Caribbean Cruise Ports can be ‘Held Hostage’ without Collective Bargaining
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=15521 Caribbean Unity? What a Joke – Tourism Missteps Again and Again
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=15380 Industrial Reboot – Cruise Tourism 2.0 – A Better End-Product for All
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14761 Flying the Caribbean Skies – Optimizing the Regional Air Travel Ecosystem
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12879 Disaster Preparation: ‘Rinse and Repeat’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=11544 Forging Change in the Cruise eco-system: Collective Bargaining
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6341 Tourism Stewardship — What’s Next?
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5210 Cruise Ship Commerce – Getting Ready for Change
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=235 Tourism’s changing profile

We have to get along with our neighbors better; we have to “share the load”.

The Go Lean book quotes the Singer-Songwriter Bill Withers in his 1970 Hit Song “Lean On Me”. (Bill Withers died earlier in 2020). Art imitates Life and Life imitates Art as the song lyrics explain, here:

If there is a load you have to bear
That you can’t carry
I’m right up the road
I’ll share your load
If you just call me.

If one or two Caribbean countries adapt a mandatory Travel Insurance scheme, then really, all countries should consider. That universality can create more demand; a greater demand can create greater supply options; greater supply options can create better pricing and quality options.

This is Travel Insurance 101.

This is Economics 101.

People will get sick; people will die. Be prepared!

So we must reform and transform the Caribbean’s societal engines so as to assuage the dangers of global pandemics and natural disasters. This is the quest of the Go Lean roadmap. and this is not just a pipe dream; it is conceivable, believable and achievable for our regional stakeholders to do better and be better with regional tourism promotion and protections.

All Caribbean stakeholders – residents and tourists alike – are urged to lean-in to this roadmap for change … and empowerment. We can make the region a better place to live work and play. 🙂

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

About the Book
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) and the Caribbean Central Bank (CCB), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Who We Are
The movement behind the Go Lean book – a non-partisan, apolitical, religiously-neutral Community Development Foundation chartered for the purpose of empowering and re-booting economic engines – stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 12 – 13):

x. Whereas we are surrounded and allied to nations of larger proportions in land mass, populations, and treasuries, elements in their societies may have ill-intent in their pursuits, at the expense of the safety and security of our citizens. We must therefore appoint “new guards” to ensure our public safety and threats against our society, both domestic and foreign. The Federation must employ the latest advances and best practices … to assuage continuous threats against public safety. …

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

——————

Appendix VIDEO – Travel insurance 2020 don’t make the mistake traveling without travel insurance – https://youtu.be/nWlWTy3kAEE



Jerry Brown Travels
Published July 12, 2020 – Understanding travel insurance protect yourself by using international travel insurance. COVID-19 has changed our lives and the way we travel.

Why should I consider international travel medical insurance?

Buying a travel medical insurance plan is a smart choice for international travelers. When you’re far from home, this type of plan provides insurance benefits designed for travelers and non-insurance travel assistance services.

Travel with Us on YouTube https://goo.gl/SCHrdw

Subscribe Now – It’s FREE: Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/jerrybrowntra…

Follow us on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/JerryBrownTr…

Want to improve your Spanish now? get 5% off: https://travelspanishconfidence.com/?…

https://youtu.be/nWlWTy3kAEE

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Banking on the Bank: IDB

Posted on October 10, 2020 in Economics, Government, Industries, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

All you parents of grown children already know this, right?

Your grown children – married or not – will come to you for financial help when “push comes to shove”.

This is true for families and countries.

This is especially actuated right now as the Coronavirus COVID-19 Pandemic has been devastating communities, economies and healthcare systems around the world, and even more so here in the Caribbean.

Your sons and daughters can turn to you fathers and mothers for help – if you are able.

Who do countries turn to?

For the 30 member-states of the Caribbean, the answer is:

Inter-American Development Bank (IDB)
The Inter-American Development Bank (IADB or IDB or BID) is the largest source of development financing for Latin America and the Caribbean.[1] Established in 1959, the IDB supports Latin American and Caribbean economic development, social development and regional integration by lending to governments and government agencies, including State corporations.

The IDB has four official languages: English, French, Portuguese, and Spanish.
…

History
At the First Pan-American Conference in 1890, the idea of a development institution for Latin America was first suggested during the earliest efforts to create an inter-American system. The IDB became a reality under an initiative proposed by President Juscelino Kubitshek of Brazil. The Bank was formally created on April 8, 1959, when the Organization of American States drafted the Articles of Agreement establishing the Inter-American Development Bank.[2]

Member states

Borrowing members in green, non-borrowing members in red

The Bank is owned by 48 sovereign states, which are its shareholders and members. Only the 26 borrowing countries are able to receive loans.

…

Governance
The IDB is governed by its Board of Governors, a 48-member body who regularly meets once a year. In March 2010, reunited in Cancun, Mexico, the Board of Governors of the Bank agreed on a $70 billion capital increase, along with full debt forgiveness for Haiti, its poorest member country, devastated by an earthquake that had destroyed its capital, Port-au-Prince, two months before.

The developing countries that borrow from the IDB are the majority shareholders, and therefore control the majority of the decision-making bodies of the Bank. Each member’s voting power is determined by its shareholding: its subscription to the Bank’s ordinary capital. The United States holds 30 percent of the Bank’s shares, while the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean combined hold 50.02 percent but with another 20% from Europe the US can veto decisions.[5] This arrangement is unique in that the developing member countries, as a group, are the majority shareholders. Though this arrangement was first viewed as risky, it is believed by some that strict peer pressure prevents the borrowers from defaulting, even when under severe economic pressure.

Source: Retrieved October 5, 2020 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inter-American_Development_Bank

———-

About Us: Inter-American Development Bank
We work to improve lives in Latin America and the Caribbean. Through financial and technical support for countries working to reduce poverty and inequality, we help improve health and education, and advance infrastructure. Our aim is to achieve development in a sustainable, climate-friendly way. With a history dating back to 1959, today we are the leading source of development financing for Latin America and the Caribbean. We provide loans, grants, and technical assistance; and we conduct extensive research. We maintain a strong commitment to achieving measurable results and the highest standards  of integrity, transparency, and accountability.

The IDB prioritizes social inclusion and equality; productivity and innovation; and regional economic integration in its development work across Latin America and the Caribbean. In doing so, it addresses the cross-cutting issues of gender equality and diversity; climate change and environmental sustainability; and institutional capacity and the rule of law. Learn more about the Institutional Strategy here.

Source: https://www.iadb.org/en/about-us/overview retrieved October 5, 2020.

Yes, the Caribbean is Banking on the Bank, the IDB.

The IDB doesn’t lend to anyone else other than these Latin American & Caribbean (LAC) member-states. It’s a ” personal piggy-bank”, just for its members – membership has it’s privileges.

Look here at the Bahamas; they are hurting very bad, due to the pandemic and also 2019’s Category 5 Hurricane Dorian; so all they have to do – all they are doing – is ringing up their personal banker and getting their requested money … on demand:

VIDEO – [Bahamas] Government To Borrow $1.3B – https://www.facebook.com/OURNewsREV/videos/251591122579990/


Posted May 27, 2020 – The Minnis administration will seek parliamentary approval to borrow $1.3B in the 2020/2021 fiscal year. In his Budget Communication today, Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Finance Peter Turnquest said the fiscal deficit is budgeted at some $1.3B, or 11.6% of GDP.

Yes, the Bahamas is Banking on the Bank, the IDB.

Despite the tune of this writing, this easy access to cash, loans or debt is not a good thing. The money is not free and not cheap.

It must also be repaid in US Dollars – OUCH!!!

The perils of this fiscal practice is evident in this news article here, describing how the Bahamas, in an attempt to source funds cheaper than their IDB options, have issued bonds for public consumption with a return rate of 9.25 percent. (To me, this means that IDB lending must be even more expensive). See the article here:

Title: Gov’t offers high-yield bond
By: Chester Robards
The government of The Bahamas has issued its $600 million, 12-year unsecured foreign currency bond, with a 9.25 percent yield, telling a tale of the Moody’s June credit rating downgrade to junk bond status, and the country’s continuing dependence on a depressed tourism market.

Guardian Business caught a glimpse of the government’s offering synopsis. The offering was reportedly released on Wednesday.

The government has gone to international markets in hopes of covering half of its projected $1.3 billion fiscal deficit for 2020/2021, brought on by the devastating consequences of Hurricane Dorian and the economic stopping effects of the global COVID-19 pandemic.

The government listed its use of proceeds as “general 2020/2021 budgetary needs and the repayment of $248 million under 2020 bridge facility”.

The bond matures in 2032.

The government announced last month that it had already closed on about half a billion in financing over July and August, and revealed then that it would go to capital markets to access more financing when market conditions were right.

The government received $200 million from the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB); a $40 million facility with the Caribbean Development Bank; and in August accessed $248 million, as part of a $300 million bridge financing deal approved by Parliament for the fiscal year 2020/2021 budget.

CFAL Senior Financial Analyst Angelo Butler explained to this paper that this most recent bond’s interest rate has likely been set at a high 9.25 percent to attract sufficient investors to make the offering successful.

He added that the high coupon could compensate for a low pool of potential investors as a result of the country’s recent downgrade; uncertainty surrounding tourism and our dependence on it; a deterioration in government finances; and growing foreign debt as a percentage of total debt and gross domestic product.

“Fortunately, the rate is attractive and should attract investors,” said Butler.

“Interest rates are very low in developed markets, thus fund managers and banks are having to search for yield to meet investment targets.”

The government’s past 2029 and 2033 bonds have taken a hit this year with price declines of close to 30 percent earlier in the year. The 2033 bond is trading at about 8.7 percent.

Cruise ship companies, which have also had to go to the markets to raise money as they have been shut down most of the year, have also placed high-yield bonds.

Source: Posted and retrieved October 9, 2020 from: https://thenassauguardian.com/govt-offers-high-yield-bond/

It is so sad that the Bahamas is Banking on the Bank, the IDB. They are in desperate need of alternative funding schemes, ones that mitigate debt. This theme, that debt is bad for Caribbean member-states, aligns with many previous commentaries from the movement behind the 2013 book Go Lean … Caribbean; see a sample list here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19572 MasterClass: Economics and Society
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=11647 Righting a Wrong: Puerto Rico’s Bankruptcy
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7601 Beware of Vulture Capitalists
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7268 Detroit’s ‘debt reality’ giving schools their ‘Worst Shot’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5183 A Lesson in History – Troubles from Mexico’s Unpaid Debt

We are not limited to the Status Quo for Debt Management in the Caribbean. The challenge is money … or capital. We can be Better. We must be Better.

The Go Lean book presents a plan to reboot the region’s fiscal and monetary landscape. The starting approach is to form a cooperative among the region’s existing Central Banks, branding the cooperative as the Caribbean Central Bank (CCB). Then facilitating and regulating the Capital Markets in the region. (The Go Lean book – on Page 200 – identifies 9 different Stock Exchanges in the region).

The example from the United States is that of Treasury Bonds and Municipal Bonds trading on Wall Street with bond rates and “coupon rates” lower than 2% – see example here; compare this 2% to the 9.25% in the foregoing news article:

The Go Lean book, serving as a roadmap for the introduction of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), presents an actual advocacy to present the strategies, tactic and implementation to Better Manage Debt. See here some of the specific plans, excerpts and headlines from Page 114, entitled:

10 Ways to Better Manage Debt

1 Lean-in for the treaty for the  Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) & the Caribbean Central Bank (CCB).

This treaty allows for the unification of the region into one market, thereby creating a single economy of 30 member-states, 42 million people and a GDP of over $800 Billion, according to 2010 figures. The CU will reboot the economic engines of the region with investments in infra-structure and business inducements. Many times these projects require up-front capital but the returns will be garnered slowly over time. These projects therefore require debt, from the capital or lending markets. The issue of debt not only concerns governments, but individuals as well. The CU will impact this dynamic by mastering credit ratings and offering to buy back foreign debt for local C$ financing and CCB controls. This tactic lets the CCB function as a local IMF, fostering a new regime for the economy.
2 M1 & The Interest Economy

The CU seeks to consolidate the currency of each member-state around the Caribbean Dollar (C$); then by inducing more electronic transactions as opposed to paper currency, there will be more lendable funds in the money supply (M1). Plus having viable capital markets will allow governments, institutions and businesses to get the capital they need, and investors/lenders can garner interest income for the use of their funds. Most Pension funds depend on this model.
3 Public Financing

Every independent country in the Caribbean is a member of the IMF, only the Overseas Territories are not engaged in this arrangement. Why not? Their host countries (US, UK, France and the Netherlands) provide the capital access that the island territories need. The CU quest is to shift this dependency to a Caribbean source, not European or American.
4 Bonds & Add-on’s (Warrants)
5 CU Federal Bankruptcies
6 Credit Reporting – Sharpening the Tool
7 Retail Credit Reboot and New Engines
8 Student Loans Sensible Dynamics
9 Mortgage Loan Sensible Dynamics
10 Crowd Sourcing – Community Capital Sharing Mitigates Debt

The points of fostering best-practices in Debt Management is not a “magical formula”, but rather a viable technocratic plan. It is conceivable, believable and achievable to accomplish these goals.

It is just heavy-lifting …

… and trust …

… and cooperation.

Let’s get busy … and make our homeland a better place to live, work and play. 🙂

About the Book
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU) and the Caribbean Central Bank (CCB), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Who We Are
The movement behind the Go Lean book – a non-partisan, apolitical, religiously-neutral Community Development Foundation chartered for the purpose of empowering and re-booting economic engines – stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 12 – 13):

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

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Toxic Environment – Make the Caribbean Great (Anew)

Posted on September 30, 2020 in Economics, Ethos, Government, Industries, Strategy

Make America Great Again!

When candidate Donald Trump emerged in 2015 with this campaign slogan, one question that so many observers asked was:

When was America Great the first time?

So then, perhaps the Greatness that America had – that Trump reminisced about – was only for a limited scope for people that were:

White, Male, Straight, Rich, Able-bodied …

There are lessons from this fallacious historic summary that we can learn in the Caribbean.

Was there ever a time that our 30 member-states (individually or collectively) would have been considered as Great societies?

The consensus answer is No! Just the opposite, we have always suffered from Toxic Environments; from discovery to slavery to colonization to American parasite status.

So a campaign slogan for the Caribbean member-states (individually or collectively) could now be:

Make the Caribbean Great (Anew)

This is the completion of this Teaching Series from the movement behind the 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean, related to Toxic Environments. The book asserts that with the adoption of certain community ethos and the execution of certain strategies, tactics and implementation, our communities can reach a destination of Greatness.

Every month, the Go Lean movement presents a Teaching Series to address issues germane to Caribbean life and culture. For this month of September 2020, we were looking at the actuality of persecuted minorities and stagnated economies in the homeland. Our Toxic Environment have curtailed the opportunities for many people to live, work and play at home; so they have been compelled to seek refuge abroad.  This is entry 6-of-6; it presents the thesis that “without attempts towards greatness” our neighborhoods and workplaces just become more-and-more Toxic. There is no standing still in this fast moving world. There is only one choice, do the heavy-lifting to Make the Caribbean Great or watch the eventual abandonment of our society – drip by drip.

Consider here, the full catalog of the series this month:

  1. Toxic Environment: Ready for Football – Washington “Redskins”
  2. Toxic Environment: Homophobia – The problem is the Hate, not the Fear – Encore
  3. Toxic Environment: Opposite of Diversity & Inclusion
  4. Toxic Environment: Lessons from Yugoslavia
  5. Toxic Environment: Ease of Doing Business
  6. Toxic Environment: Make the Caribbean Great (Anew) – Encore

The Go Lean book, serving as a roadmap for the introduction of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), asserts that Caribbean stakeholders must do the heavy-lifting to remediate our Toxic Environments, and them keep pushing forward to foster a Great Society. The purpose of the Go Lean roadmap is to optimize the economic, security and governing engines of society. The end result must be that we retain people in-country and maybe even entice the Diaspora to return. The purpose of these past entries in this month’s Teaching Series was to reinforce the foundation of Caribbean society. We must reform and transform. Yes, we can!

How do we Make the Caribbean Great?

No seriously!

How? Not just talking the talk – the campaign slogan – but walking the walk. Is this destination of Greatness really conceivable, believable and achievable?

We have addressed this question before and answered it accordingly.

There is a formula for moving from “Good to Great”.

This subject was thoroughly addressed in a previous Go Lean commentary from March 2, 2016; it analyzed the book by Jim Collins: Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap … and Others Don’t.

Since that 2016 date, we have published a few additional commentaries that presented strategies, tactics and implementations to pursue greatness, or chronicled goodness. Consider this sample list of previous blog-commentaries:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20551 Naomi Osaka: A Good Sport – On and Off the Court
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20371 Success – and a Great Society – looks like New Zealand
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20363 A Good Pandemic Playbook: Bubble Strategy
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20203 Pluralism is the goal for a Great Caribbean Society
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20180 A Good Start for Reforming Black Image: Corporate Reboots
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19835 Good Leadership: Example – “Leader of the Free World”?
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19831 Good Leadership: Next Generation of ‘Agile’ Project Delivery
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18749 A Great Place to Work – Global Auto Conglomerate: Mercedes-Benz
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16002 Good Governance: Good Corporate Compliance; JPMChase Model
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=15479 ‘Lean Is’ as ‘Lean Does’ – Good Project Management
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=11386 Building Better Cities – Reform the cities; then reform the country

It is only apropos to Encore the original blog-commentary from March 2016; see that here now:

——————-

Go Lean Commentary – Going from ‘Good to Great’

caribbean_viewThe Caribbean is arguably the greatest address on the planet.

So declares the book Go Lean…Caribbean. This not only refers to terrain, but also culture (music, food, festivals, fun, etc.) and hospitality. Despite these arguable facts, the societal engines in the Caribbean (economy, security, and governance) are NOT great; in some cases, they may not even be considered “good”, as we do feature a few Failed-States in the region.

For the sake of this commentary, we give every Caribbean member-state a scholarship and assume they are “good”. Now how do we go from “Good to Great”?

The book Go Lean…Caribbean represents a quest to make the Caribbean a Great place to live, work and play. But there is actually a formula to making a society (or company/organization) great, as opposed to just being good. Below is the book review and accompanying VIDEO of the landmark publication by writer – see Appendix – and management consultant Jim Collins:

Book Title: Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap … and Others Don’t
Executive Summary

CU Blog - Going from Good to Great - Photo 1Jim Collins, already established as one of the most influential management consultants, further established his credibility with the wildly popular Good to Great: Why Some Companies Make the Leap…and Others Don’t, originally published in 2001. The book went on to be one of the bestsellers in the genre, and it is now widely regarded as a modern classic of management theory.

Collins takes up a daunting challenge in the book: identifying and evaluating the factors and variables that allow a small fraction of companies to make the transition from merely good to truly great. ‘Great,’ an admittedly subjective term, is operationally defined according to a number of metrics, including, specifically, financial performance that exceeded the market average by several orders of magnitude over a sustained period of time. Using these criteria, Collins and his research team exhaustively catalogued the business literature, identifying a handful of companies that fulfilled their predetermined criteria for greatness. Then, the defining characteristics that differentiated these ‘great’ firms from their competitors were quantified and analyzed.

The resulting data are presented in Good to Great in compelling detail. Over the course of 9 chapters, Collins addresses a number of management, personnel, and operational practices, behaviors, and attitudes that are both conducive and antithetical to the good-to-great transition. One overarching theme that links together virtually all of Collins’ arguments is the need to define a narrowly focused objective and field of competency and then focus all of the company’s resources toward that area of strength. Repeatedly, Collins warns that straying too far from a company’s established strengths is inimical to the attainment of greatness. Finally, Collins links the findings of Good to Great to the conclusions he reached in his previous book, Built to Last, which focused on the factors that define companies that survive in the long-term, meshing both sets of results into an overarching framework for enduring success.

Chapter Summaries

Chapter 1: Good is the Enemy of Great

The first chapter of the book lays out the criteria that Collins and his research team used in selecting the companies that served as the basis of the meta-analysis that provided the findings set forth in the book. The most important factor in the selection process was a period of growth and sustained success that far outpaced the market or industry average. Based on the stated criteria, the companies that were selected for inclusion were Abbott, Fannie Mae, Circuit City, Gillette, Kimberly-Clark, Kroger, Nucor, Philip Morris, Pitney Bowes, Walgreens, and Wells Fargo.

Collins also offers a few of the most significant findings gleaned from the study. Of particular note are the many indications that factors such as CEO compensation, technology, mergers and acquisitions, and change management initiatives played relatively minor roles in fostering the Good to Great process. Instead, Collins found that successes in three main areas, which he terms disciplined people, disciplined thought, and disciplined action, were likely the most significant factors in determining a company’s ability to achieve greatness.

Chapter 2: Level 5 Leadership

In this chapter, Collins begins the process of identifying and further explicating the unique factors and variables that differentiate good and great companies. One of the most significant differences, he asserts, is the quality and nature of leadership in the firm. Collins goes on to identify “Level 5 leadership” as a common characteristic of the great companies assessed in the study. This type of leadership forms the top level of a 5-level hierarchy that ranges from merely competent supervision to strategic executive decision-making.

By further studying the behaviors and attitudes of so-called Level 5 leaders, Collins found that many of those classified in this group displayed an unusual mix of intense determination and profound humility. These leaders often have a long-term personal sense of investment in the company and its success, often cultivated through a career-spanning climb up the company’s ranks. The personal ego and individual financial gain are not as important as the long-term benefit of the team and the company to true Level 5 leaders. As such, Collins asserts that the much-touted trend of bringing in a celebrity CEO to turn around a flailing firm is usually not conducive to fostering the transition from Good to Great.

Chapter 3: First Who, Then What

The next factor that Collins identifies as part of the Good to Great process is the nature of the leadership team. Specifically, Collins advances the concept that the process of securing high-quality, high-talent individuals with Level 5 leadership abilities must be undertaken before an overarching strategy can be developed. With the right people in the right positions, Collins contends that many of the management problems that plague companies and sap valuable resources will automatically dissipate. As such, he argues, firms seeking to make the Good to Great transition may find it worthwhile to expend extra energy and time on personnel searches and decision-making.

Collins also underscores the importance of maintaining rigorousness in all personnel decisions. He recommends moving potentially failing employees and managers to new positions, but not hesitating to remove personnel who are not actively contributing. He also recommends that hiring should be delayed until an absolutely suitable candidate has been identified. Hewing to both of these guidelines, Collins claims, will likely save time, effort, and resources in the long-term.

Chapter 4: Confront the Brutal Facts (Yet Never Lose Faith)

Another key element of some companies’ unique ability to make the transition from Good to Great is the willingness to identify and assess defining facts in the company and in the larger business environment. In today’s market, trends in consumer preferences are constantly changing, and the inability to keep apace with these changes often results in company failure. Using the example of an extended comparative analysis of Kroger and A & P, Collins observes that Kroger recognized the trend towards modernization in the grocery industry and adjusted its business model accordingly, although doing so required a complete transformation of the company and its stores. A & P, on the other hand, resisted large-scale change, and thus guaranteed its own demise.

Collins outlines a four-step process to promote awareness of emerging trends and potential problems: 1) Lead with questions, not answers; 2) Engage in dialogue and debate, not coercion; 3) Conduct autopsies without blame; and 4) Build red flag mechanisms that turn information into information that cannot be ignored.

Chapter 5: The Hedgehog Concept (Simplicity Within the Three Circles)

In this chapter, Collins uses the metaphor of the hedgehog to illustrate the seemingly contradictory principle that simplicity can sometimes lead to greatness. When confronted by predators, the hedgehog’s simple but surprisingly effective response is to roll up into a ball. While other predators, such as the fox, may be impressively clever, few can devise a strategy that is effective enough to overcome the hedgehog’s simple, repetitive response.

Similarly, Collins asserts, the way to make the transformation from Good to Great is often not doing many things well, but instead, doing one thing better than anyone else in the world. It may take time to identify the single function that will be a particular firm’s “hedgehog concept,” but those who do successfully identify it are often rewarded with singular success. In order to help expedite this process, Collins suggests using the following three criteria: 1) Determine what you can be best in the world at and what you cannot be best in the world at; 2) Determine what drives your economic engine; and 3) Determine what you are deeply passionate about.

Chapter 6: A Culture of Discipline

Another defining characteristic of the companies that Collins defined as great in his study was an overarching organizational culture of discipline. He is quick to point out that a culture of discipline is not to be confused with a strict authoritarian environment; instead, Collins is referring to an organization in which each manager and staff member is driven by an unrelenting inner sense of determination. In this type of organization, each individual functions as an entrepreneur, with a deeply rooted personal investment in both their own work and the company’s success.

Although this discipline will manifest itself in a high standard of quality in the work that is produced by managers and employees alike, its most significant outcome will be an almost fanatical devotion to the objectives outlined in the “hedgehog concept” exercises. Disciplined workers will be better equipped to hew to these goals with a single-minded intensity that, according to Collins, will foster the transformation from merely Good to Great. In addition, the author asserts, it is important that within this overarching culture of discipline, every team member is afforded the degree of personal empowerment and latitude that is necessary to ensure that they will be able to go to unheard-of extremes to bring the firm’s envisioned objectives into existence.

Chapter 7: Technology Accelerators

Today, many businesses have come to depend upon technology to increase efficiency, reduce overhead, and maximize competitive advantage. However, Collins cautions that technology should not be regarded as a potential panacea for all that ails a company. The folly of this kind of thinking was revealed in the aftermath of the crash of the tech bubble in the early 2000s. The market correction threw into sharp relief the differences between sustainable uses of the Internet to extend established businesses and ill-planned, unviable online start-ups.

Collins contends that the good-to-great companies approach the prospect of new and emerging technologies with the same prudence and careful deliberation that characterizes all of their other business decisions. Further, these companies tend to apply technology in a manner that is reflective of their “hedgehog concepts” — typically by selecting and focusing solely upon the development of a few technologies that are fundamentally compatible with their established strengths and objectives. Collins characterizes the ideal approach to technology with the following cycle: “Pause — Think — Crawl — Walk — Run.”

Chapter 8: The Flywheel and the Doom Loop

In this chapter, Collins describes two cycles that demonstrate the way that business decisions tend to accumulate incrementally in either an advantageous or a disadvantageous manner. Both, the author emphasizes, accrue over time. Despite the popular misperception that business success or failure often occurs suddenly, Collins asserts that it more typically occurs over the course of years, and that both only transpire after sufficient positive or negative momentum has been accrued.

Collins describes the advantageous business cycle that, in some cases, can foster the transition from Good to Great as “the flywheel effect.” By making decisions and taking actions that reinforce and affirm the company’s “hedgehog” competencies, executives initiate positive momentum. This, in turn, results in the accumulation of tangible positive outcomes, which serve to energize and earn the investment and loyalty of the staff. This revitalization of the team serves to further build momentum. If the cycle continues to repeat in this manner, the transition from Good to Great is likely to transpire. In contrast, the doom loop is characterized by reactive decision-making, an overextension into too many diverse areas of concentration, following short-lived trends, frequent changes in leadership and personnel, loss of morale, and disappointing results.

Chapter 9: From Good to Great to Built to Last

In the concluding chapter of Good to Great, Collins makes a connection between this book and his previous work, Built to Last, which represented the findings of a six-year study into the factors that determined whether a new company would survive in the long-term. First and foremost, Collins contends that companies need a set of core values in order to achieve the kind of long-term, sustainable success that may lead to greatness. Companies need to exist for a higher purpose than mere profit generation in order to transcend the category of merely good. According to Collins, this purpose does not have to be specific — even if the shared values that compel the company toward success are as open-ended as being the best at what they do and achieving excellence consistently, that may be sufficient as long as the team members are equally dedicated to the same set of values.

Although many of the conclusions of both of the books overlap, Collins notes that Good to Great should not be seen as the follow-up to Built to Last, which focuses on sustaining success in the long-term. Instead, Good to Great actually functions as the prequel to Built to Last. First, a company should focus on developing the foundation that is necessary to work toward greatness. Then, they can begin to apply the principles of longevity that are set forth in Built to Last.
Source: Wikipedia Online Encyclopedia’s Wiki-Summaries – Retrieved 03/02/2016 –
http://www.wikisummaries.org/Good_to_Great:_Why_Some_Companies_Make_the_Leap…_and Others_Don’t

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VIDEO: Video Review for ‘Good To Great by Jim Collins’ – https://youtu.be/Yk7bzZjOXaM

Published on Aug 16, 2013 – Employee Engagement with http://callibrain.com

This is video review for the book Good To Great by Jim Collins, produced by Callibrain, employee engagement through social collaboration and execution discipline.
To buy the book click here – http://www.amazon.com/Good-Great-Comp…
Category: Education
License: Standard YouTube License

CU Blog - Going from Good to Great - Photo 2The talk of societal greatness is en vogue right now. This is election season in the United States and one candidate for President, Donald J. Trump, pledges to “Make America Great Again”; see photo here.

Greatness also aligns with other empowerment efforts, like the advocacy championed by the Great Place to Work® Institute.

The book Go Lean … Caribbean stresses the need to create a great society of all of the Caribbean. It serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation for the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). As a federation or federal government, there will be the need to pursue greatness organizationally to benefit all stakeholders (residents, Diaspora, visitors, trading partners, etc.). There is also the need to employ and empower a Civil Service workforce; this labor pool is projected to be only 30,000 people, thusly embracing lean (or agile) delivery methodologies. So all the references in the foregoing regarding organization, enterprise, company and/or firm could apply directly and indirectly to the CU Trade Federation.

Yet, these federal civil servants are not the only focus of the Go Lean/CU roadmap. The prime directives of this roadmap covers these 3 focus areas:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.

With the success of this roadmap, the Caribbean region will be enabled to go from Good to Great! With confidence now, we can truly declare that “A Change Is Gonna Come“.

But any change must be permanent! The Go Lean book declares that for permanent change to take place, there must first be an adoption of new community ethos, the national spirit that drives the character and identity of its people. The roadmap was constructed with the following community ethos in mind, plus the execution of strategies, tactics, implementation and advocacies to move from Good to Great. The following is a sample of these specific details from the book:

Community Ethos – Deferred Gratification Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principles – Economic Systems Influence Individual Choices Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principles – The Consequences of Choices Lie in the Future Page 21
Community Ethos – Governing Principles – Lean Operations Page 24
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Future Page 26
Community Ethos – Ways to Foster Genius Page 27
Community Ethos – Ways to Help Entrepreneurship – Incubators Page 28
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact Research & Development Page 30
Community Ethos – Ways to Improve Sharing Page 35
Community Ethos – Ways to Promote Happiness Page 36
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Greater Good Page 37
Anecdote – LCD versus an Entrepreneurial Ethos Page 39
Strategy – Mission – Build and foster local economic engines Page 45
Tactical – Confederating a Permanent Union Page 63
Tactical –  Separation of Powers: Federal Administration versus Member-States Governance Page 71
Implementation – Ways to Pay for Change Page 101
Planning – Ways to Make the Caribbean Better – Live, Work and Play Empowerments Page 131
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Create Jobs Page 152
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Governance in the Caribbean Region Page 168
Advocacy – Ways to Better Manage the Social Contract Page 170
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Leadership Page 171
Advocacy – Ways to Manage Federal Civil Service Page 173
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Communications – Improve the Messaging Page 186
Advocacy – Ways Impact Main Street Page 201
Advocacy – Ways to Preserve Caribbean Heritage Page 218
Advocacy – Ways to Protect Human Rights Page 220
Advocacy – Ways to Help the Middle Class Page 223
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Urban Living Page 234
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Rural Living Page 235

The Go Lean/CU roadmap identifies, qualifies and proposes the establishment of technocratic administration throughout the region to impact all societal engines.

Previously, Go Lean blogs commented on developments – in the public sector and also with industrial and entrepreneurial endeavors – showing the success of aspiring to be better and do better. Consider this sample:

Blink Health: The Cure for High Drug Prices
Oil Refineries – Strategy for Advanced Economics
Addressing and Fixing High Consumer Prices
Movie Review: ‘Tomorrowland’ – ‘Feed the right wolf’ in Society
Better than America? Yes, We Can!
‘Change the way you see the world; you change the world you see’
How One Entrepreneur Can Rally a Whole Community
Making a Great Place to Work®
Book Review: ‘Prosper Where You Are Planted’
Book Review: ‘Citizenville – Take the Town Square Digital and Reinvent Government’

Now is the time for all Caribbean stakeholders, employees in the public and private sectors, to lean-in to this regional solution – the Go Lean roadmap – for the Caribbean to go from Good to Great. While a good homeland may seem satisfactory, we now see that satisfactory is not good enough – we lose too many of our citizens as they flee to foreign shores for refuge.

The desired destination is not “good”, but rather “great”. We want to make the Caribbean a Great place to live, work and play.   🙂

Download the book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

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Appendix – Bibliography of Jim Collins

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Toxic Environment – Ease of Doing Business

Posted on September 28, 2020 in Ethos, Government, Industries, Planning

Go Lean Commentary

Peace and Prosperity …

This is what we want – it is just that simple – to live harmoniously with our neighbors while we provide for ourselves and our loved-ones. But this is not so automatic! There must be empowerments and protections in the societal engines to allow citizens to obtain these goals. Failures in the delivery of these empowerments and protections will create chaos, dysfunctions, Toxic Environments and even:

Failed-States

If we do nothing, the end result is a Failed-State.

If we do the wrong things … Failed-State. This has been the focus of this current series on remediating Toxic Environments.

So societal stakeholders must be a part of the solution; they must help … for the sake of Peace and Prosperity.

When there is a lack of Peace and Prosperity, a Toxic Environment can easily emerge. Let’s focus now on Prosperity. That means there must be a solution for jobs (full-time and gigs), entrepreneurial and investment opportunities. This is the focus on this commentary, the means for prosperity. The same effort we put on promoting  Peace must also be put on fostering Prosperity. Without the opportunity for citizens to live prosperously, the environment becomes Toxic.

We do not want Toxic Environments … anymore.

In fact, this has been the focus of this Teaching Series from the movement behind the 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean – which serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). This roadmap asserts that Caribbean economic, security (Public Safety) and governing stakeholders must all work hand-in-hand to remediate our Toxic Environments. Every month, the movement behind the Go Lean book presents these Teaching Series to address issues germane to Caribbean life and culture. For this month of September 2020, this is entry 5-of-6, we are looking at how to improve the homeland so that our citizens can prosper where they are planted; all citizens, not just some privileged few and definitely be On Guard for any discrimination against a persecuted minority.

As alluded here, a lack of opportunities for the masses, or limitation of opportunities to a privileged few only, or blatant discrimination to persecuted minorities trying to participate in the economic eco-system describe the Toxic Environment that we currently suffer here in the Caribbean. The end result of such Toxic Environment is inexcusable human flight due to these Push and Pull dynamics:

  • “Push” refers to people who feel compelled to leave, to seek refuge in a foreign land. “Refuge” is an appropriate word; because of societal defects, many from the Caribbean must leave as refugees – think LGBT, Disability, Domestic-abuse, Medically-challenged – for their life, liberty and pursuit of happiness.
  • “Pull”, on the other hand refers to the lure of a more prosperous life abroad; many times our people are emigrating for societies that have better expressions of the rights for “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”.

Toxic Environments have a direct correlation to Push and Pull dynamics. We need to always monitor these factors and societal defects. This is the purpose of this month’s Teaching Series. Consider here, the full catalog of the series this month:

  1. Toxic Environment: Ready for Football – Washington “Redskins”
  2. Toxic Environment: Homophobia – The problem is the Hate, not the Fear
  3. Toxic Environment: Opposite of Diversity & Inclusion
  4. Toxic Environment: Lessons from Yugoslavia
  5. Toxic Environment: Ease of Doing Business
  6. Toxic Environment: Make the Caribbean Great (Anew)

The subject of prosperity versus Toxic Environment is a concern for the stewards of the new Caribbean – promoters of the CU Trade Federation, and also for the United Nations-backed financial institution, the World Bank. In fact, the World Bank produces an Annual Ranking of all participating countries for the assessment of the Ease of Doing Business. This ranking measures the success-failure of National Governments to facilitate the creation of new businesses and expansion by existing businesses.

Yes, it can be measured.

Some reporting Nation-States do it better than others.

The ones that fail, create a Toxic Environment for those trying to improve prosperity in their homeland. These failures and the Toxic Environments push good people to flee and leave for “greener pastures”.

See the summary of the 2020 Ease of Doing Business Report here; (notice, New Zealand is #1):

Title: World Bank – Ease of Doing Business Ranking
Overview
Doing Business 2020, a World Bank Group flagship publication, is the 17th in a series of annual studies measuring the regulations that enhance business activity and those that constrain it. Doing Business presents quantitative indicators on business regulations and the protection of property rights that can be compared across 190 economies—from Afghanistan to Zimbabwe—and over time.

Doing Business covers 12 areas of business regulation. Ten of these areas—starting a business, dealing with construction permits, getting electricity, registering property, getting credit, protecting minority investors, paying taxes, trading across borders, enforcing contracts, and resolving insolvency—are included in the ease of doing business score and ease of doing business ranking. Doing Business also measures regulation on employing workers and contracting with the government, which are not included in the ease of doing business score and ranking.

By documenting changes in regulation in 12 areas of business activity in 190 economies, Doing Business analyzes regulation that encourages efficiency and supports freedom to do business. The data collected by Doing Business address three questions about government. First, when do governments change regulation with a view to developing their private sector? Second, what are the characteristics of reformist governments? Third, what are the effects of regulatory change on different aspects of economic or investment activity? Answering these questions adds to our knowledge of development.

Data in Doing Business 2020 are current as of May 1, 2019.

Main findings:

  • Doing Business captures 294 regulatory reforms implemented between May 2018 and May 2019. Worldwide, 115 economies made it easier to do business.
  • The economies with the most notable improvement in Doing Business 2020 are Saudi Arabia, Jordan, Togo, Bahrain, Tajikistan, Pakistan, Kuwait, China, India and Nigeria. In 2018/19, these countries implemented one-fifth of all the reforms recorded worldwide.
  • Economies in Sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America and the Caribbean continue to lag in terms of reforms. Only two Sub-Saharan African economies rank in the top 50 on the ease of doing business; no Latin American economies rank in this group.
  • Doing Business 2020 continues to show a steady convergence between developing and developed economies, especially in the area of business incorporation. Since 2003/04, 178 economies have implemented 722 reforms captured by the starting a business indicator set, either reducing or eliminating barriers to entry.
  • Those economies that score well on Doing Business tend to benefit from higher levels of entrepreneurial activity and lower levels of corruption.
  • While economic reasons are the main drivers of reform, the advancement of neighboring economies provides an additional impetus for regulatory change.
  • Twenty-six economies became less business-friendly, introducing 31 regulatory changes that stifle efficiency and quality of regulation.

Source: See the Full 149 Page Report retrieved September 26, 2020 from: https://www.doingbusiness.org/en/reports/global-reports/doing-business-2020

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Click on Photo to Enlarge

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VIDEO – Tracking the “Ease of Doing Business” Around the World – https://youtu.be/NvwOzxR2lf0

World Bank
Posted October 31, 2017 – To learn more: http://wrld.bg/29Na30genKg

It takes global entrepreneurs significantly less time to start businesses, obtain construction permits and transfer property, making many developing countries more competitive. The World Bank’s latest Doing Business report says worldwide unemployment could be eased if countries continue to cut red tape and promote business-friendly policies. #DoingBiz

Innovation comes from innovators. Every community have innovative people, but not all communities foster opportunities. Governments can streamline the business creation-expansion process with incubators and optimized regulations. Consider this Case Study of former US President Jimmy Carter’s policies that created the now hot micro-brewery industry in the United States:

In 1920, due to Prohibition, breweries across the United States were closed down or began making malt for other purposes. The Homebrewing of beer with an alcohol content higher than 0.5% remained illegal until 1978 when Congress passed a bill repealing Federal restrictions and excise taxes,[8] and President Jimmy Carter signed the bill, H.R. 1337, into law.[9] Within months of homebrewing’s full legalization, Charlie Papazian founded the Brewers Association and American Homebrewers Association. – Source: Homebrewing

In 1979, Carter deregulated the American beer industry by making it legal to sell malt, hops, and yeast to American home brewers for the first time since the effective 1920 beginning of Prohibition in the United States.[156] This Carter deregulation led to an increase in home brewing over the 1980s and 1990s that by the 2000s had developed into a strong craft microbrew culture in the United States, with 6,266 micro breweries, brewpubs, and regional craft breweries in the United States by the end of 2017.[157] – Source: Jimmy Carter

“Prosper where planted” – Yes, we can …

This idea and prospect of “prospering where planted” is important to the movement behind the Go Lean book. In fact, this subject was stressed in a previous Go Lean commentary; see this summary:

So how do we prosper where we’re planted? While this is a simple question (based on the Bible principle of Psalms 1:3), the answer is more complex. …

… the Go Lean roadmap uses cutting-edge delivery of best practices to employ strategies, tactics and implementations to impact its prime directives; identified with the following 3 statements:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.

The successful execution of these directives will allow Caribbean stakeholders to prosper, while remaining as residents in their homeland. The Go Lean book seeks to optimize the entire Caribbean economic/security/governance eco-system to reach this goal.

[There needs to be] a “Hustling” Attitude, [which the Go Lean book describes as an] Entrepreneurial Ethos (Page 28).

The Go Lean movement had previously presented more blog-commentaries on the subject of fostering prosperity. See a sample list here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20371 Success Looks like New Zealand
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19189 Brains are already here; now to bring in the opportunities
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=17358 There could be a “Marshall Plan” for Prosperity
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16000 Better Balance of Regulations or Laissez-faire creates Economic Growth
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=10043 Integration Plan for Greater Caribbean Prosperity
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5034 Patents and IP Protections: The Guardians of Innovation

We have good ideas … that will create jobs and entrepreneurial opportunities. Imagine the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics/Medical (STEM) fields and all those innovative ideas. Under this Go Lean roadmap, there will now be new stewards in Caribbean society to foster Research & Development. Economic activities will flourish … not just for the STEM participants (High Tech), but many down-line positions as well: Low Tech and No Tech.

The Go Lean roadmap introduces other strategies as well, like Infrastructure projects, Exclusive Economic Zones, Self-Governing Entities and Public-Private Partnerships. These strategies will reboot the industrial landscape in the region.

2.2 million new jobs is conceivable, believable and achievable.

This is what we must do: Mitigate Toxic Environments and foster prosperous homelands.

Let’s do this – let’s make our homelands better places to live, work and play.  🙂

About the Book
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Who We Are
The movement behind the Go Lean book – a non-partisan, apolitical, religiously-neutral Community Development Foundation chartered for the purpose of empowering and re-booting economic engines – stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 12 – 14):

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accidence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxvi.  Whereas the Caribbean region must have new jobs to empower the engines of the economy and create the income sources for prosperity, and encourage the next generation to forge their dreams right at home, the Federation must therefore foster the development of new industries, like that of ship-building, automobile manufacturing, prefabricated housing, frozen foods, pipelines, call centers, and the prison industrial complex. In addition, the Federation must invigorate the enterprises related to existing industries like tourism, fisheries and lotteries – impacting the region with more jobs.

xxvii. Whereas the region has endured a spectator status during the Industrial Revolution, we cannot stand on the sidelines of this new economy, the Information Revolution. Rather, the Federation must embrace all the tenets of Internet Communications Technology (ICT) to serve as an equalizing element in competition with the rest of the world. The Federation must bridge the digital divide and promote the community ethos that research/development is valuable and must be promoted and incentivized for adoption.

xxviii. Whereas intellectual property can easily traverse national borders, the rights and privileges of intellectual property must be respected at home and abroad. The Federation must install protections to ensure that no abuse of these rights go with impunity, and to ensure that foreign authorities enforce the rights of the intellectual property registered in our region.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

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Toxic Environment – Opposite of ‘Diversity & Inclusion’

Posted on September 24, 2020 in Ethos, Government, Industries, Social

Go Lean Commentary

Picture this:

You spend $2,000 per night for accommodations for your Caribbean vacation.
You go to bed, only to be awaken by a fuzzing noise outside. You pull back the curtains and there it is:

  • A burning cross erected outside your window!

How long before you want to leave?
Will you ever return?
Will you tell your friends to come visit or stay away?
Why this persecution?

  • The guest in this scenario is a known Gay Man (LGBT), or …
  • The guest in this scenario is a foreigner from Wuhan, China, or …
  • The guest in this scenario is a Muslim from Dubai, in the Middle East.

This describes the Toxic Environment that we suffer here in the Caribbean. The 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean, serving as a roadmap for the introduction of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), asserts that Caribbean economic, security (Public Safety) and governing stakeholders must work to mitigate and remediate our societal defects.

Despite the mono-industrial landscape of tourism, where we need to be inviting and hospitable to all visitors, many times we have chosen the opposite instead, to be: intolerant and judgmental. We give in, on a daily basis to:

This is not theory or conjecture; these intolerance, condemnations and judgments have happened and are happening … repeatedly.

Opponents of a gay rights bill gather in Guyana in 2003. (AP)

People march during a protest against gay rights in
Port-au-Prince, Haiti, Sunday, July 26, 2020.
The group marched demanding that President Jovenel Moise
rescind his most recent decree that rewrites the 185-year-old penal code,
addressing discrimination based on sexual orientation. Dieu Nalio Chery AP

 

Jamaican Anti-Gay Rally to Oppose Same-Sex Marriage, Even Though No One Has Proposed It

A previous Go Lean commentary from April 8, 2017 identified this example of our severe Caribbean Toxicity. Consider this summary:

‘Loose Lips Sink Ships’ – Leaders Undermine Tourism
… there is no war in the Caribbean, but we do have battles. We have trade wars and economic struggles to try and maintain our way of life and to improve it. For so many of our countries, tourism is the primary economic driver – our regional ship – we have to be on guard and aware of any kind of disparaging talk that can undermine the appeal of our destinations.

The United States is suffering the dire consequence of “loose lips sinking ships” right now. The new President – Donald Trump – has made disparaging remarks about certain foreign groups, and then introduced policies that reinforce his disdain for these foreigners.

As a result, more and more foreigners are refusing to come to the US for leisure travel. …

Nobody wants to spend their money in a place where they are not welcomed.

This lesson must be learned in the Caribbean. We have the same threats afoot. Unlike the US, who has the leverage and surety of “richest Single Market economy in the world” to absorb the fall, the Caribbean member-states are mostly Third World and failing.

… Yet, some leaders – Christian pastors in this case – have proclaimed, in a signed petition to this new American President, a heightened level of disdain for certain American tourists. They are protesting the US Human Rights agenda to seek relief for Caribbean populations with affinity for persons ascribing to the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Trans-Gender (LGBT) lifestyles.

Rather than love and leisure … in the Caribbean, these community leaders are projecting “a climate of hate”.

A Toxic Environment bears bad fruit. It is not just homophobia that we are inflicted with, as we have hate and intolerance embedded within our Community Ethos – this refers to (as defined in the Go Lean book Page 20):

  1. the fundamental character or spirit of a culture; the underlying sentiment that informs the beliefs, customs, or practices of a group or society; dominant assumptions of a people or period: In the Greek ethos the individual was highly valued.
  2. the character or disposition of a community, group, person, etc.

Look at these additional phobias that have plagued our society, here in the Caribbean. These are the opposite of the pluralistic society that we feature/want. See these examples of anti-Diversity & Inclusion reality:

Sinophobia
The problem with having an intolerant society is that our citizens are less inclined to embrace people that are different, even when you need them. This is the situation with China right now. As there is an exhaustion from North American and European investors in Caribbean communities, China has stepped-up and stepped-in with funds and development support.

We, in the Caribbean, badly need all the help.

Yet, our people are so reticent towards Chinese foreigners, despite that we “hung a Welcome Sign” for visitors from around the world. We must face it, we – a majority Black-and-Brown population in most of 30 member-states – are part of the problem, as it appears that we only want to embrace “White Christian” foreigners.

Fears of new virus trigger anti-China sentiment worldwide – February 2, 2020
As fears of a new coronavirus from China spread around the world, many countries are seeing rising anti-Chinese sentiment, calls for a full travel ban on Chinese and even public aversion to those from the epicenter of the outbreak.

The subject of the Sinophone eco-system – China, Chinese people and culture – has been an important subject for Caribbean considerations. We have published previous commentaries that advocated for a healthy relationship with the Sino World; consider the list of previous blog-commentaries here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18963 Happy Chinese New Year – Embracing the Sinophone World
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18301 After Dorian, Rebuilding Partners: China Versus America
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16530 European Reckoning – China seeks to de-Americanize World’s economy
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=9550 10 Things We Want from China and 10 Things We Do Not Want
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6231 China’s Caribbean Playbook: America’s Script

Islamophobia
The actuality of Intolerance is the opposite of the qualities a pluralistic society like the Caribbean needs to develop. We have a new found economic engine that we can now exploit: Global Tourism. Imagine the profits that can be garnered for just being Better Versions of ourselves, “to just live and let live”. While this is just Common Sense, we find that Common Sense is not so common. In fact, just the opposite have occurred; in some societies Islamophobia has been enshrined in Public Policy. See the example from Australia here:

Islamophobia is practically enshrined as public policy in Australia
… any 28-year-old in Australia has grown up in a period when racism, xenophobia and a hostility to Muslims in particular, were quickly ratcheting up in the country’s public culture.

In the period of the country’s enthusiastic participation in the War on Terror, Islam and Muslims have frequently been treated as public enemies, and hate speech against them has inexorably been normalised.

We must do better in the Caribbean. In fact, Muslims are an integral part of our regional society; they have every right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. If we honor that, not only can we have peace, but profit too. Imagine catering to the global Muslim community to enjoy our hospitality. (We had asserted the same about the Hindu community). See the Appendix VIDEO below for a glimpse of a previous celebration.

That requires a welcoming attitude of Diversity & Inclusion. Some communities see the need for this work – see here:

Trinidad – Confronting issues in Islam
… Non-Muslims should always be encouraged to exercise tolerance and understanding. But the standard defence of denying the ‘perpetrators as true Muslims’ or stating that ‘this is not Islam’ is no longer convincing. This may be part of the reason for the absence of worldwide outpouring over the massacres in Istanbul, Baghdad and Saudi Arabia as opposed to the response that Paris, Brussels and Orlando received. The backlash has gone beyond hate crimes and prejudice and is now one of apathy and indifference ie, ‘If they want to kill each other, let them go right ahead, as long as they leave the rest of us alone.’ The unfortunate truth is that Muslims, regardless of how friendly or moderate they may appear, are still looked upon with suspicion.

This is what is meant by “Good Community Ethos”, the positive group qualities, that this Go Lean movement encourages our people to foster.

Diversity & Inclusion is not automatic; in fact, it is the opposite; it takes hard work. But if we do the work, we can have benefits; we can remediate and mitigate a Toxic Environment. Diversity & Inclusion can and do work. Look at this opportunity:

How an ancient Islamic holiday became uniquely Caribbean on Trinidad shores
In Trinidad, the 100,000 Muslims who make up 5 percent of the island’s total population, celebrate the day of Ashura, as Hosay – the name derived from “Hussein.”

The first Hosay festival was held in 1854, just over a decade after the first Indian Muslims began to arrive from India to work on the island’s sugar plantations.

But Trinidad at the time was under British colonial rule and large public gatherings were not permitted. In 1884, the British authorities issued a prohibition against Hosay commemorations. Approximately 30,000 people took to the streets, in Mon Repos, in the south, to protest against the ordinance. Shots fired to disperse the crowd killed 22 and injured over 100. The ordinance was later overturned.

The “Hosay Massacre” or “Muharram Massacre,” however, lives in people’s memories.

As we see, Orthodoxy – from religious and cultural heritage – can hurt community harmony; it can discourage people from the libertarian view to “live and let live”. The Muslim World so often was on the receiving side of religious intolerance. But don’t get it twisted, Islam and the Muslim World is not a model for Diversity & Inclusion themselves; we have lots of examples of their intolerance (i.e. Middle East country of Jordan and their LGBT Intolerance).

This commentary is a continuation on the Teaching Series related to Toxic Environments where we addressed the pseudo-phobias – irrational fear or hatred – that have made life unbearable in the homeland. But now we see how this kind of intolerance imperils the economic engines as well. Yes, we’ve “shot ourselves in the foot” … again!

Every month, the movement behind the Go Lean book presents a Teaching Series to address issues germane to Caribbean life and culture. For this month of September 2020, we are looking at the actuality of persecuted minorities in this homeland. The qualities we need in the region is that of Diversity & Inclusion. Instead we get the opposite …

… we get homophobia, xenophobia and islamophobia; which are not real “phobias” (fear) but instead are representative of dislike, disapproval, prejudice, hatred, discrimination and/or hostility.

This means that we are not exactly the “greatest address on the planet”. Nope, our homelands are among the identified Toxic Environments on the planet. This is entry 3-of-6 in this series; this one presents the thesis that “our toxicity have long reaching consequences on the community quest to “live, work and play” here in the region. Our Toxic Environment makes it hard to retain our guests and tourists with encouragements for future and frequent visits. Instead, our Caribbean (tourism) industrial stakeholders must do the heavier lifting to always attract newer-and-newer visitors, rather than the easier job of repeat customers.

Consider here, the full catalog of the series this month:

  1. Toxic Environment: Ready for Football – Washington “Redskins”
  2. Toxic Environment: Homophobia – The problem is the Hate, not the Fear
  3. Toxic Environment: Opposite of Diversity & Inclusion
  4. Toxic Environment: Lessons from Yugoslavia
  5. Toxic Environment: Ease of Doing Business
  6. Toxic Environment: Make the Caribbean Great (Anew)

How can we abate the Toxic Environment described here-in:

Answer: Promote Diversity and Inclusion.

A previous Go Lean commentary from December 19, 2019 identified the benefits of an inclusive foundation – the opposite of a Toxic Environment – by studying the international conglomerate Mercedes-Benz or DaimlerBenz. Consider this summary:

Learning from Another ‘Great Place to Work’: Mercedes-Benz
A lot of companies formed 133 years ago are no longer around.

  • Time takes its toll
  • Business models change
  • Technology improves
  • Values are reformed

For the companies that have survived the “Win or Go Home” tournaments, it is important to study them and learn lessons of their successes … and failures. …

This “Old Dog” has learned a lot of “New Tricks”.

They are considered one of the Great Places to Work, by the formal Great Place to Work® Institute; they are in the Top Ten on the 2018 List. …

One such Value Reformation that Mercedes-Benz has completed that other companies, institutions and regions – this mean YOU Caribbean stakeholders – can learn from is the emphasis on Diversity and Inclusion. …

How we shape Diversity & Inclusion
Daimler employs more than 298,000 people from around 160 nations. And that is just one aspect of our company’s diversity. We shape Diversity & Inclusion with appropriate offers and measures for our employees in five dimensions:

  1. We work in international teams.
  2. We bring people from different generations together.
  3. We promote equal opportunity for all genders.
  4. We defend the rights of the LGBTI+ Community.
  5. We include people with disabilities on an equal footing.

Source: Posted December 9, 2019; retrieved December 19, 2019 from https://www.daimler.com/sustainability/basics/employees/how-we-shape-diversity-inclusion.html

The subject of Diversity & Inclusion has been an important subject for Caribbean considerations. We have thusly published a few commentaries that advocated for more Diversity & Inclusion. Consider this list of previous blog-commentaries:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19217 Brain Drain – ‘Live and Let Live’: Introducing Localism
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19203 Brain Drain – Brain Gain: Yes we can!
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=17820 Caribbean ‘Pride’ – “Can we all just get along”
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16532 European Reckoning – Settlers -vs- Immigrants
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=15998 Good Governance: The Kind of Society We Want – Minority Protections
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14316 Soft Power – Clean-up the Toxic Environments for Economic Benefits
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13321 Making a ‘Pluralistic Democracy’ – Multilingual Realities
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=8186 Respect for Minorities: ‘All For One’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3999 Sir Sidney Poitier – ‘Breaking New Ground’ as a Diversity Role Model

Majority versus minority; strong versus the weak; rich versus poor; Haves versus Have Nots…

… everywhere we turn, there are diverse people that needs to be included in the manifestation of society. This inclusion means a “seat at the table, not just being on the menu”. It is simpler than it sounds; all we have to do is “Live and Let Live”.

This has not always been the case in the past. In fact, we have some Bad Orthodoxy – many times the Caribbean religiosity has hurt rather than helped – that we must distance ourselves from. A lot of our friends, have not always been so friendly; a lot of our enemies have not been so adversarial. We need to reform from the past as we work for the new, brighter, better future.

Yes, we can …

Let’s accept the truth: we have been toxic! Let’s do the work that must be done to make our homeland a better place to live, work and play.  🙂

About the Book
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Who We Are
The movement behind the Go Lean book – a non-partisan, apolitical, religiously-neutral Community Development Foundation chartered for the purpose of empowering and re-booting economic engines – stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 11 – 13):

x. Whereas we are surrounded and allied to nations of larger proportions in land mass, populations, and treasuries, elements in their societies may have ill-intent in their pursuits, at the expense of the safety and security of our citizens. We must therefore appoint “new guards” to ensure our public safety and threats against our society, both domestic and foreign. The Federation must employ the latest advances and best practices … to assuage continuous threats against public safety.

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxiv.  Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

——————–

Appendix VIDEO – Hosay in Cedros, Trinidad (2007) – https://youtu.be/VtbaGduFVHE

Dion Samsoondar
Posted October 8, 2011 – A look at the final day of Muharram, or “Hosay” , a Shiite muslim ritual as observance in the tiny southern seaside village of Cedros, Trinidad in the Caribbean. Natural sound of tassa drums fill the air as villagers parade the tadjahs on the main street of this fishing community before the mini replica tomb are lead to the ocean for final rites. Video shot in 2007 with JVC GY-HD100U ,and edited in CS3 by Dion Samsoondar (2007).

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Toxic Environment – It Infects Everything

Posted on September 22, 2020 in Ethos, Industries, Social

Go Lean Commentary

24 “Anyone who listens to my teaching and follows it is wise, like a person who builds a house on solid rock. 25 Though the rain comes in torrents and the floodwaters rise and the winds beat against that house, it won’t collapse because it is built on bedrock. 26 But anyone who hears my teaching and doesn’t obey it is foolish, like a person who builds a house on sand. 27 When the rains and floods come and the winds beat against that house, it will collapse with a mighty crash.” – The Bible re: Building on a Solid Foundation – Matthew 7:24-27 – New Living Translation

Having a solid foundation versus a sandy foundation, for a house, may not matter too much during a normal sunny day, but when “push comes to shove” – during a storm – is when the surety of the house becomes important. Will it stand, stabilize and survive?

A weak foundation for a house can be likened to the toxic environment of a community, think a workplace filled with harassment and discrimination or a neighborhood with blatant racism where minorities endure burning crosses on their lawn.

Such communities may have some functionality, but will it stand, stabilize and survive when “push comes to shove”?

Here’s the answer: No!

As Jesus Christ cautioned above: “it will collapse with a mighty crash”.

It is fair to conclude that we all want a “house that does not collapse during a storm”. It is also fair to assume that we all want to live in a community that is NOT a toxic environment. But just as Jesus described the heavy-lifting effort of building a house on a more solid foundation, we must conclude that it is also heavy-lifting to foster a community (workplace or neighborhood) that is not a toxic environment. For the record, we got toxic environments here in the Caribbean; we got it bad. But we must reform …

Ready for the effort?!

The path of least resistance is just to “fall into hate, bigotry, xenophobia and intolerance”. But to weed these defects out of society – or to not allow them to foster – we cannot default to that path of least resistance; we must do the heavy-lifting work; the homework, the shop work and the community work.

This is an acute issue for our Caribbean communities; we have near Failed-States as a result. These blatant societal defects can no longer be tolerated. We have lost good people; many have fled our society in search of refuge; we have Pushed many away, while others have been Pulled by more hopeful invitations – the “grass on the other side has been greener”.

This was the assertion in the 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean, where it pronounced this in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Page 12):

xii. Whereas the legacy in recent times in individual states may be that of ineffectual governance with no redress to higher authority, the accedence of this Federation will ensure accountability and escalation of the human and civil rights of the people for good governance, justice assurances, due process and the rule of law. As such, any threats of a “failed state” status for any member state must enact emergency measures on behalf of the Federation to protect the human, civil and property rights of the citizens, residents, allies, trading partners, and visitors of the affected member state and the Federation as a whole.

Every month, the movement behind the Go Lean book presents a Teaching Series to address issues germane to Caribbean life and culture. For this month of September 2020, we are looking at Toxic Environments. This is entry 1-of-6; the first one; it introduces the thesis that “doing the right thing, while not always easy, always pays off in the long run”. Despite our past, we can always start anew. There have been many bad experiences of hate, bigotry, xenophobia and intolerance in our Caribbean actuality. To cure these societal defects, we must reflect, recognize, repent and reconcile.

Yes, we can …

Let’s start now! Consider here, the full catalog of the series this month:

  1. Toxic Environment: Ready for Football – Washington “Redskins”
  2. Toxic Environment: Homophobia – The problem is the Hate, not the Fear
  3. Toxic Environment: Opposite of Diversity & Inclusion
  4. Toxic Environment: Lessons from Yugoslavia
  5. Toxic Environment: Ease of Doing Business
  6. Toxic Environment: Make the Caribbean Great (Anew)

The Go Lean book, serving as a roadmap for the introduction of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), asserts that Caribbean stakeholders must do the heavy-lifting to mitigate the societal defects. The purpose of the roadmap does include optimizing the economic, security and governing engines for greater opportunities, but we must have a good foundation first. The purpose of this month’s Teaching Series is to focus on that foundation. There is a glaring need for reform, as we have a long track record of bad behavior like hate, bigotry, xenophobia and intolerance in our Caribbean communities.

We have been fostering a toxic environment in our culture in which these bad behaviors have been permitted to flourish. This is not good! A toxic environment pits villains against victims; in the long run, the victims seeks refuge elsewhere. This is true with a toxic workplace and a toxic neighborhood. This is also true for the Push dynamics of Caribbean abandonment:

  • “Push” refers to people who feel compelled to leave, to seek refuge in a foreign land. “Refuge” is an appropriate word; because of societal defects, many from the Caribbean must leave as refugees – think LGBT, Disability, Domestic-abuse, Medically-challenged – for their life, liberty and pursuit of happiness.
  • “Pull”, on the other hand refers to the lure of a more liberal life abroad; many times our people are emigrating for societies that have better expressions of the rights for “life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness”.

The Caribbean is not the first nor the last toxic environment. There are many of them out there. We must look, listen and learn from toxic workplaces and toxic neighborhoods. Just because we are not alone does not mean we can be complacent; we are still bleeding populations – we must stop the bleeding.

Let’s consider one example from the United States …

… that of the team in the National Football League (NFL), the Washington Football Team, formerly known as the Washington Redskins. Just that name “Redskins” – a derogatory reference similar the the N-Word – shows their disregard for the toxic environment they were fostering. See the details in the Appendix below.

What we have learned from the historicity of the Washington “Redskins” over those many years is that they had no regards nor remorse for offending others …

… this normally means that they would have no regards nor remorse for offending their own people. This is exactly what has happened. We learned of other victimizations of this toxic workplace. See these two stories here:

Title 1: Washington Redskins Cheerleaders Describe Topless Photo Shoot and Uneasy Night Out
By: Juliet Macur
When the Washington Redskins took their cheerleading squad to Costa Rica in 2013 for a calendar photo shoot, the first cause for concern among the cheerleaders came when Redskins officials collected their passports upon arrival at the resort, depriving them of their official identification.

For the photo shoot, at the adults-only Occidental Grand Papagayo resort on Culebra Bay, some of the cheerleaders said they were required to be topless, though the photographs used for the calendar would not show nudity. Others wore nothing but body paint. Given the resort’s secluded setting, such revealing poses would not have been a concern for the women — except that the Redskins had invited spectators.

A contingent of sponsors and FedEx Field suite holders — all men — were granted up-close access to the photo shoots.

One evening, at the end of a 14-hour day that included posing and dance practices, the squad’s director told nine of the 36 cheerleaders that their work was not done. They had a special assignment for the night. Some of the male sponsors had picked them to be personal escorts at a nightclub.

“So get back to your room and get ready,” the director told them. Several of them began to cry.

“They weren’t putting a gun to our heads, but it was mandatory for us to go,” one of the cheerleaders said. “We weren’t asked, we were told. Other girls were devastated because we knew exactly what she was doing.”

…

Source: New York Times Investigation – posted May 2, 2018; retrieved September 20, 2020. See the full story here: https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/02/sports/redskins-cheerleaders-nfl.html

————-

VIDEO 1 – Redskins Cheerleaders Reveal Disturbing Details Of 2013 Costa Rica Trip | NBC Nightly News – https://youtu.be/i7ZCHjYW2NE

NBC News
Posted May 3, 2018 – The cheerleaders tell NBC News that in addition to their passports being taken, they were forced to be topless for a calendar shoot, and later asked to escort team financial backers to a party.

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—————————————————–

Title 2: At least 15 women are accusing Washington Redskins staffers of sexual harassment, report says
By: Ellie Kaufman, Pete Muntean and Laura Robinson, CNN
The Washington Redskins have launched an internal investigation after 15 former female employees and two journalists who covered the team accused team staffers of sexual harassment and verbal abuse, the team told CNN.

The allegations were first reported by The Washington Post on Thursday. The newspaper obtained screenshots of text messages in which Richard Mann II — the team’s assistant director of pro personnel — made inappropriate, sexual comments to a female employee. Mann was fired in the past week.

Former employees also accused Larry Michael, the team’s former senior vice president of content and play-by-play announcer, of talking about the attractiveness of a college intern in 2018 when he was being recorded for a team video, the newspaper reported. Michael retired Wednesday.

CNN was not able to reach Mann and Michael for comment Thursday.

Owner Dan Snyder and former team president Bruce Allen were not directly implicated in the sexual harassment allegations brought by the female employees and reported by the Post. But Snyder was criticized for fostering a culture in which the behavior was permitted.
…

Source: Cable News Network – posted July 18, 2020; retrieved September 20, 2020. See the full story here: https://www.cnn.com/2020/07/16/us/washington-redskins-sexual-harassment-allegations/index.html

—————-

VIDEO 2 – Washington Redskins accuser says she hopes for new policies – https://youtu.be/YAAX5qGnA0w

KEYT – KCOY – KKFX News
Posted July 23, 2020 – At least 15 women are accusing Washington Redskins staffers of sexual harassment, report says

We must change (reform and transform) the Caribbean to rid ourselves of our own toxic environments. How do we do that?

A previous Go Lean commentary from March 5, 2019 identified the chain of events: thoughts-feeling-speech-action. See an excerpt here:

[Thoughts-feeling-speech-action] is usually the order and process for change. Change doesn’t just start with Action; a lot more goes into it. It can be likened to a factory process; there is input and there is output. While Action is the output, “Thoughts, Feelings and Speech” qualify as input.

Got Change? Want Change?

The movement behind the book Go Lean … Caribbean asserts that we have to be prepared to contribute the appropriate Inputs. In fact we must start changing the current Inputs to better reflect the values we want to see in our society. That means changing our thoughts, feeling and speech.

The Go Lean roadmap has always focused on the actions for changing the Caribbean eco-system. We have always had focus on the thoughts-feeling-speech-action continuum. The target change here is what the Go Lean book refers to as a change in community ethos (Page 20).

  1. the fundamental character or spirit of a culture; the underlying sentiment that informs the beliefs, customs, or practices of a group or society; dominant assumptions of a people or period: In the Greek ethos the individual was highly valued.
  2. the character or disposition of a community, group, person, etc.

This focus, fostering change in the community ethos, has been a mission for this Go Lean movement from the beginning of this movement. This theme has been elaborated in many previous blog-commentaries; consider this sample here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20281 Cleaning up the Toxic Use of the N-Word to improve Black Image
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20105 When Rising from the Ashes – Watch Out for changes to Bad Ethos
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19833 Stamping Out Hypocrisy from Community Ethos & Leadership
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=17464 The need to change Bad Ethos to launch ‘New Commerce’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16408 Mitigating Bad Ethos on Home Violence
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2480 Learning a Lesson from History – Changed Community Ethos for WW II
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=214 Changing from Least Common Denominator to an Entrepreneurial Ethos

Cleaning up our toxic environment is conceivable, believable and achievable. We have seen it done many times before.

But, it is not just a matter of changing a brand name – like for the Washington Redskins – we have to change the community attitude. We have to message against:

hate, bigotry, xenophobia and intolerance

The presence of these bad attributes are not in dispute. The strategy for abating them is not in dispute. It starts and ends with messaging. This is 1-of-6 in that messaging. The rest of this Teaching Series portrays the messaging for the above-cited attributes. You are urged to lean-in to every entry of this series to glean the insights, strategies, tactics and implementations.

We cannot change the world, but we can change “us”. It is heavy-lifting to abate bad attributes, to reform and transform our society. But this is what must be done. It is the only way to make our regional homeland a better place to live, work and play.

Yes, we can!  🙂

About the Book
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion & create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Who We Are
The movement behind the Go Lean book – a non-partisan, apolitical, religiously-neutral Community Development Foundation chartered for the purpose of empowering and re-booting economic engines – stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 12):

x. Whereas we are surrounded and allied to nations of larger proportions in land mass, populations, and treasuries, elements in their societies may have ill-intent in their pursuits, at the expense of the safety and security of our citizens. We must therefore appoint “new guards” to ensure our public safety and threats against our society, both domestic and foreign. The Federation must employ the latest advances and best practices … to assuage continuous threats against public safety.

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xiv.  Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation. 

—————

Appendix – Reference: Washington Redskins

The Washington Football Team are a professional American football team based in the Washington metropolitan area. Formerly known as the Washington Redskins, the team competes in the National Football League (NFL) as a member of the NFC East division. The team plays its home games at FedExField in Landover, Maryland, with its headquarters and training facility located in Ashburn, Virginia. The team has played more than 1,000 games and is one of only five in the NFL to record over 600 total wins. It was the first NFL franchise with an official marching band and a fight song, “Hail to the Redskins“.

The team was founded in 1932 as the Boston Braves before changing its name to the Redskins the following year. The franchise then relocated to Washington, D.C. in 1937, where they have been based since. …

Washington’s former Redskins name and logo drew controversy over its history, with many criticizing it as offensive to Native Americans. Pressure from major sponsors of the league and team eventually led them to retire the branding in 2020 as part of a wave of racial name changes in the wake of the George Floyd protests. The team will play as the Washington Football Team until a permanent replacement is chosen later. The team is valued at approximately US$3.4 billion according to Forbes, making them the seventh-most valuable team in the NFL and the 14th-most valuable sports franchise globally.[2]
…

Redskins name and logo controversy
The team’s former Redskins branding, used from 1933 until 2020, was one of the leading examples of Native American mascot controversy as the term redskin has been defined as offensive,[81] disparaging,[82][83] and taboo.[84] Various people and groups, such as the National Congress of American Indians (NCAI), considered the name a racial slur and attempted to get the team to change it for decades.[85][86] Supporters of the name countered both the dictionary definition of the term and the testimony of Native Americans by asserting that their use of the name was intended respectfully, and referred only to the football team and its history.

In a 2013 letter “To the Washington Redskins Nation”, team owner Daniel Snyder stated that while respecting those that say they are offended, a poll conducted by the Annenberg Public Policy Center in 2004 found that 90% of Native Americans were not offended by the name and logo.[87][88] This poll was essentially replicated in 2016 by The Washington Post with near identical results. However, public opinion polling, which places the question about the Redskins within a longer telephone survey on other topics, was deemed scientifically questionable by academic researchers. As an alternative, social scientists from the University of Michigan and University of California at Berkeley performed a study in 2020 that measured Native American opinion in detail, finding that 49% had responded that the name was offensive, with the level of offense increasing to 67% for those with a stronger involvement in Native American culture.[89]

Following renewed attention to questions of racial justice in wake of the George Floyd protests in 2020, a letter signed by 87 shareholders and investors was sent to team and league sponsors Nike, FedEx, and Pepsi urging them to cut their ties unless the name was changed.[90][91][92] Around the same time, several retail companies began removing Redskins merchandise from their stores.[93][94] In response, the team underwent a review in July 2020 and announced that it would retire its name,[95][96] with a new name and logo to be chosen at a later date.[97][98] As a team rebranding process usually takes over a year, the team will be playing as the Washington Football Team until a more permanent name is chosen.[99][100][101]

Source: Retrieved September 20, 2020 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Washington_Football_Team

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‘Climate Change’ raging Worse for some compared to others

Posted on September 20, 2020 in Ethos, Industries, Planning, Social

Go Lean Commentary

We are all in this together! – popular fallacy for global problems

This is not true for Climate Change. Some communities are on the frontlines; some communities take all the beatings, while some other communities are unscathed.

Inequality rules the day!

This writer recently repatriated back to the Caribbean (Bahamas) in 2019 and have consistently endured power utility bills of US$900 to US$1,100 during the summer months. “Our A/C never goes off”.

Most residents in Caribbean communities cannot afford this actuality. This is not about enjoying; this is about enduring.

This has always been true in society: There are the Haves and the Have-Nots. But what is emerging in the Climate Change eco-system, is not just the individual inequalities, but rather the national inequalities. Some countries have suffered pangs of distress from Climate Change … some countries have-not.

Though we have experienced and expressed these distresses, this is not our thoughts alone …

No, the highly-regarded New York Times has recently published their own formal journalistic depiction of this assertion. See that story highlights here:

Title: A warming world
In the past 60 years, every decade has been hotter than the last, and 2020 is on track to be among the hottest years yet. But the burden of extreme heat is not shared equally — it’s significantly worse for people at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder.

Extreme heat can exacerbate poor health, ravage crops and make it dangerous to work outside. And in many parts of the world, simple ways to alleviate those effects — like water, or electricity for fans and air-conditioners — are a luxury.

Somini Sengupta, The Times’s international climate reporter, and a team of photographers have a new story that documents how rising temperatures are affecting people across multiple continents.

Excerpts
The agony of extreme heat, though, is profoundly unequal.
This Is Inequity at the Boiling Point

It was a record 125 degrees Fahrenheit in Baghdad in July, and 100 degrees above the Arctic Circle this June. Australia shattered its summer heat records as wildfires, fueled by prolonged drought, turned the sky fever red.

For 150 years of industrialization, the combustion of coal, oil and gas has steadily released heat-trapping gases into the atmosphere, driving up average global temperatures and setting heat records. Nearly everywhere around the world, heat waves are more frequent and longer lastingthan they were 70 years ago.

But a hotter planet does not hurt equally. If you’re poor and marginalized, you’re likely to be much more vulnerable to extreme heat. You might be unable to afford an air-conditioner, and you might not even have electricity when you need it. You may have no choice but to work outdoors under a sun so blistering that first your knees feel weak and then delirium sets in. Or the heat might bring a drought so punishing that, no matter how hard you work under the sun, your corn withers and your children turn to you in hunger.

It’s not like you can just pack up and leave. So you plant your corn higher up the mountain. You bathe several times a day if you can afford the water. You powder your baby to prevent heat rash. You sleep outdoors when the power goes out, slapping mosquitoes. You sit in front of a fan by yourself, cursed by the twin dangers of isolation and heat.

Extreme heat is not a future risk. It’s now. It endangers human health, food production and the fate of entire economies. And it’s worst for those at the bottom of the economic ladder in their societies. See what it’s like to live with one of the most dangerous and stealthiest hazards of the modern era.  …

Heat waves are becoming more frequent in Athens. It’s toughest in the city’s treeless, concrete neighborhoods.

… Mr. Hotak was 16 when he left his home in the Sholgara district of Afghanistan, the only one among his 11 brothers and sisters to do so. After one failed attempt to enter Europe and two years in a refugee camp, he was granted asylum in Greece. That’s when he arrived on the rooftop refuge with a friend, in the crowded warrens of Kolonos, a working class Athens neighborhood where many migrants have settled.

The city has grown hotter by the decade. According to temperature records kept by the National Observatory of Athens, there were fewer than 20 hot days (with temperatures over 99 degrees Fahrenheit, or 37 Celsius) from 1897 until 1906. By the mid-1980s, there were still fewer than 50 hot days per decade. From 2007 to 2016, though, the number had risen to 120 hot days. …

In Athens, heat waves have increased fivefold over the last century. Diminished rains and longer dry seasons are destroying Guatemala’s farmlands, where Indigenous farmers could see crop yields fall sharply. In Nigeria, hotter nights make it easier for mosquitoes to breed, increasing the risk of mosquito-borne diseases. And in the United States, heat kills older people more than any other extreme weather event, including hurricanes.

We spoke with Somini about what she described as “one of the most profound inequities of the modern age.”

“I have seen over the last couple of years the impact of what is truly a global problem,” she said. “We know that high heat and humidity is a dangerous combination for health, agriculture and economies of whole regions — nearly everywhere around the world, heat waves are more frequent and longer lasting than they were 70 years ago.”

What do experts recommend to combat rising temperatures?

“Draw down the combustion of fossil fuels,” Somini said. “The world is capable of getting off coal in many instances, capable of vastly reducing the burning of oil and gas.”

But the world also has to adjust to the extreme heat we’re seeing already, she said. That includes making water, air-conditioners and fans more accessible, and planting trees to bring down temperatures in cities.

“It could also mean adjusting things you might not immediately think of, like labor laws so people don’t have to work for hours under the blistering sun, agricultural changes in farming methods or what is grown in what place to adapt to higher temperatures,” she said.

“In short, it requires doing everything pretty differently.”

In other climate news:

Source: posted August 6, 2020; retrieved September 14, 2020 from:  https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2020/08/06/climate/climate-change-inequality-heat.html

Go Lean Commentary continues …

What’s next for the Caribbean? While excessive heat and the need for air-conditioning is critical, the pang of distress that impacts us most severely is that of hurricanes. Remember Irma, Maria or Dorian …

Hurricanes are worse; more frequent and more powerful. In fact for 2020, the meteorological officials have ran out of names to assign for this year’s Atlantic Hurricane season. They are now assigning the Greek alphabet as hurricane names; think Alpha, Beta, Gamma, Delta, Epsilon, etc.. Here is the actuality of the Alpha Storm here:

Subtropical Storm Alpha (2020)
… a very unusual subtropical cyclone that made landfall in Portugal, the first ever recorded occurrence for the country. The system was also the easternmost-forming Atlantic tropical cyclone on record in the basin, exceeding the previous record of Tropical Storm Christine in 1973.[1] The twenty-fourth cyclone and twenty-second named storm of the extremely active and record-breaking 2020 Atlantic hurricane season, Alpha originated from a large non-tropical low that was first monitored by the National Hurricane Center on 15 September. Initially not anticipated to transition into a tropical cyclone, the low gradually tracked south-southeastward for several days with little development. By 18 September, the low began to separate from its frontal features and exhibited sufficient organization to be classified as a subtropical cyclone as it approached the Iberian Peninsula, becoming a subtropical storm later that day. Alpha made landfall just north of Lisbon, Portugal during the evening of 18 September, becoming the first recorded landfalling (sub)tropical cyclone in mainland Portugal.[2] Alpha was also the third confirmed (sub)tropical cyclone landfall in mainland Europe, following a hurricane in Spain in 1842 and Hurricane Vince (as a tropical depression) in 2005. Alpha rapidly weakened and became a remnant low early on 19 September.

There is no denying, this is all relative! Imagine a necessary ingredient for managing snow removal in society: rock salt. If there was a shortage of rock salt, countries nearer to the Arctic and Antarctic poles would be more directly affected. It does not snow in the tropical regions, near the equator, so these would be disaffected.

Well, the opposite is occurring; there are shortages – like precipitation, cool breezes, shady trees – and dire consequences (drought, forest fires, storms, flooding, rising sea levels, etc.) being endured in the tropical regions and the communities closer to the poles are less affected. (Note: Melting glacial ice does have universal effects with rising sea levels; think Canada).

The dire consequences of Climate Change are not equally shared. This actuality has fostered the threat of Climate Refugees or Migrants – people leaving one part of the planet – think: deserts of the Middle East and North Africa – to seek refuge in lesser affected locales, like Western Europe and North America.

Ready or not, climate migration is now also acute here in the Caribbean. Societal abandonment had previously been identified as the most dire threat to Caribbean society. The 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean opens with this declaration:

There is something wrong in the Caribbean … instead of the world “beating a path” to these doors, the people of the Caribbean have “beat down their doors” to get out.

So first there was the brain drain (college educated population), but now we are noticing the rest of society also taking leave:

  • Overseas Territories – i.e. Puerto Rico, USVI, Aruba, St. Martin, Martinique, Bermuda, Caymans, etc. – have no hope of retaining young people.
    • High School Graduation on Friday; flights to the colonizing Fatherland on Saturday.
  • Independent countries emigrate through legal (family sponsor-ships) and illegal means (trafficking).

As stated in the opening, we are not all in “this” together! There are the “Haves and the Have-Nots”. This is the new normal; we must adapt to this new reality; see the VIDEO portrayal in the Appendix below. This is a consistent theme in many previous Go Lean commentaries; see a sample here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19347 Go Green … Caribbean … finally
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18182 Disaster Relief: Helping, Not Hurting
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12949 Grow Up Already! The Caribbean must manage Charities ourselves
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=12068 Abating Climate Change – Ready to reboot, reform and transform
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=10895 Not expecting the relief and refuge only from others – Readying Ourself
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=9455 Fix Climate Change – Yes, We Can
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7103 COP21 – Caribbean lands acknowledges ‘Climate Change’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5462 American Red Cross raised $500 million for Haiti but kept most of it
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3432 OECS diplomat has dire warning for the Caribbean looking for hand-outs

Our choices are that simple: prepare for Climate Change or watch our people migrate away from the homeland to foreign shores where the dire effects are lessened. While all humans are created equal, all people do not get equal treatment from … Mother Nature. Some people get more hot and wet than other people, yet they may not be able to afford the physical relief.

Even air-conditioning may not be equally accessible to everyone – we need cooperative refrigeration.

There are strategies, tactics and implementations to abate Climate Change and relieve the dire consequences for people and property. We can … must endure this new normal. This is how and why we can make our homeland a better place to live, work and play.  🙂

About the Book
The book Go Lean…Caribbean serves as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), for the elevation of Caribbean society – for all member-states. This CU/Go Lean roadmap has these 3 prime directives:

  • Optimization of the economic engines in order to grow the regional economy to $800 Billion and create 2.2 million new jobs.
  • Establishment of a security apparatus to ensure public safety and protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines, including a separation-of-powers between the member-states and CU federal agencies.

The Go Lean book provides 370-pages of turn-by-turn instructions on “how” to adopt new community ethos, plus the strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to execute so as to reboot, reform and transform the societal engines of Caribbean society.

Download the free e-Book of Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

Who We Are
The movement behind the Go Lean book – a non-partisan, apolitical, religiously-neutral Community Development Foundation chartered for the purpose of empowering and re-booting economic engines – stresses that reforming and transforming the Caribbean societal engines must be a regional pursuit. This was an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 11 – 13):

i. Whereas the earth’s climate has undeniably changed resulting in more severe tropical weather storms, it is necessary to prepare to insure the safety and security of life, property and systems of commerce in our geographical region. As nature recognizes no borders in the target of its destruction, we also must set aside border considerations in the preparation and response to these weather challenges.

xi. Whereas all men are entitled to the benefits of good governance in a free society, “new guards” must be enacted to dissuade the emergence of incompetence, corruption, nepotism and cronyism at the peril of the people’s best interest. The Federation must guarantee the executions of a social contract between government and the governed.

xvi. Whereas security of our homeland is inextricably linked to prosperity of the homeland, the economic and security interest of the region needs to be aligned under the same governance. Since economic crimes … can imperil the functioning of the wheels of commerce for all the citizenry, the accedence of this Federation must equip the security apparatus with the tools and techniques for predictive and proactive interdictions.

xxiv. Whereas a free market economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, the Federation must install the controls to better manage aspects of the economy: jobs, inflation, savings rate, investments and other economic principles. Thereby attracting direct foreign investment because of the stability and vibrancy of our economy.

Sign the petition to lean-in for this roadmap for the Caribbean Union Trade Federation.

—————–

Appendix VIDEO – Refugees Are Fleeing Climate Change – https://youtu.be/nIlMHFwC1MM


The YEARS Project
Tens of millions of people could be displaced by climate change by the end of this century. Climate scientist Michael Oppenheimer explains why that matters, why he supports the right to migrate, and what governments need to do to prepare.
This story is part of Covering Climate Now, a global collaboration of more than 250 news outlets that aims to strengthen coverage of the climate crisis.

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