Tag: Aruba

Long Train of Abuses: Dutch Hypocrisy – Liberal Amsterdam vs Conservative Antilles

Posted on December 12, 2020 in Ethos, Locations, Social

Go Lean Commentary

There continues to be a Long Train of Abuses in the Caribbean countries. There are 30 member-states – all with European legacies – some independent countries and some dependent territories, but the assessment is the same:

We have many societal defects; we do not always treat our neighbors as neighborly as we should; at times we have been toxic and hostile towards certain minority groups and we have chased many people away, causing them to flee for refuge abroad.

We need to reform and transform Human Rights protections in our homeland. If only we can be more like the countries our emigrants seek refuge in! Destinations like the US, Canada, the United Kingdom and the European Union. If only we can be more liberal – live and let live – compared to our conservative or intolerant nature. Why the difference?

The European Union (EU), in its short history, has been very good for regulating Human Rights through out the EU member-states and the whole world for that matter.  In fact, after the actuality of World War I and World War II being fought within Europe and by opposing European factions, the EU was recognized as the new dampening force that held the 27 member-states together in peaceful harmony. For this grandiose accomplishment, they were awarded the 2012 Nobel Peace Prize. The 2013 book Go Lean … Caribbean relates (Page 130):

Nobel Peace Prize
The 2012 Nobel Peace Prize was awarded to the EU “for over six decades having contributed to the advancement of peace and reconciliation, democracy and human rights in Europe” by unanimous decision of the committee in Norway.

That page in the book goes on to relate another benefit of the EU, the day-to-day enforcement of Human Rights:

Human Rights Declaration
Values like human dignity, freedom, democracy, equality, and the rule of law and respect for human rights have been embedded in the EU treaties right from the start.

There are Caribbean territories that are actually members of the European Union … kinda. That would be the French Antillean islands (Guadeloupe, Martinique, St. Bartholomew and St. Martin) and the Netherlands Antilles (Aruba, Bonaire, Curaçao, Saba, Sint Eustatius, and Sint Maarten). The Netherlands Antilles have gone through some upheavals, with integration and secession events. At this moment, the 6 islands have the status of either constituent states within the Kingdom of the Netherlands or direct parts of the Netherlands proper, governed by the capitol in Amsterdam as “special municipalities”. At this juncture the Netherlands Antilles have this status in the EU, according to Wikipedia:

Status in the European Union
The Kingdom of the Netherlands is a member of the European Union. However, Aruba, Curaçao, and Sint Maarten have the status of overseas countries and territories (OCTs) and are not part of the EU. Nevertheless, only one type of citizenship exists within the Kingdom (Dutch), and all Dutch citizens are EU citizens (including those in the OCTs).

All of this history helps to explain why there is a difference in the European Netherlands versus the Caribbean ( Antillean) Netherlands. Why the difference?

For one, religiosity is a driving force for the Community Ethos of Caribbean society. “Community Ethos”, that is defined as a noun, as:

  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.
  2. the character or disposition of a community, group, person, etc.

This is a continuation of the monthly Teaching Series from the movement behind the Go Lean book on the Long Train of Abuses that have molded our people and our society. We do indeed have societal defects that were embedded in our colonial past but didn’t evolve as our Host Colonizers (i.e. The Netherlands, Holland or Amsterdam) evolved. We are stuck in time …

We are partying like its 1869 …

Remember the bad religious orthodoxy that was discussed in the previous entries in this blog series;  how these “hatreds” were embedded in national edicts (Law-and-Order) over the centuries: Slavery, Colonialism , Patriarchy / Gender Rights, White Supremacy, Buggery / LGBT Rights, Child Abuse.

This monthly Go Lean Teaching Series always presents issues that are germane to Caribbean life and culture and how to address them. For this month of December 2020, we are looking at the Long Train of Abuses that have pushed our people away from the homeland. This is entry 5-of-6; which illustrates that embedded intolerance in Caribbean society has had the bad consequences of chasing good people away from the Antillean Netherlands to go to the European Netherlands. This is the “Dutch” all around; yet the clear assessment of toxicity and dysfunction in the tropical islands is a clear contrast to the progressive liberalism in the European homeland. We feature a Long Train of Abuses that we have to endure, while Amsterdam features a laissez-faire attitude that has been more inviting and appealing.

The full catalog of the series this month is as follows:

  1. Long Train of Abuses: Enough Already – Colonialism Be Gone!
  2. Long Train of Abuses: Overseas Masters – Cannot See Overseas
  3. Long Train of Abuses: Religious Leadership in Politics – Reconciling Trump
  4. Long Train of Abuses: Religious Character in Society – Human Rights
  5. Long Train of Abuses: Dutch Hypocrisy – Liberal Amsterdam vs Conservative Antilles
  6. Long Train of Abuses: Puerto Rico – “Take the Heat” or “Get out of the Kitchen”

The Netherlands Antilles is in crisis; they continue to suffer from a Long Train of Abuses … they cannot hold on to their young people or any of their highly educated citizens – Brain Drain. People are fleeing to … the European Netherlands – rated as one of the best places to live, work and play.

See this previous Go Lean commentary on Aruba, the biggest Dutch Caribbean community. Consider this excerpt:

The State of Aruba’s Economy – February 19, 2015
The largest of the Dutch Caribbean is Aruba.

Aruba called for secession from the Netherlands Antilles from as early as the 1930s, becoming a separate state within the Kingdom of the Netherlands in 1986. After many other organizational developments, by 2010, Aruba is dispositioned as one of the four constituent countries that form the Kingdom of the Netherlands, along with the Netherlands (European homeland), Curaçao and Sint Maarten.

What is the status of Aruba today?

How has it fared as an autonomous state?

The Go Lean book posits that Aruba is in crisis; (along with the rest of the Caribbean). This is also the assessment by the International Monetary Fund, as related in this news article:

    1. By: The Caribbean Journal staff
      1. Aruba’s economy is “recovering gradually” from a “severe double-dip recession,” according to the International Monetary Fund, which recently concluded its 2015 Article IV Mission to the Dutch Caribbean island.
        The recession was [exacerbated] by a pair of factors: the global financial crisis and the shutdown of the oil refinery in Aruba. …

Aruba fails to keep its young people at home. In fact, the anecdotal experience (one story after another) is that young people abandon this island as soon as they finish high school; many never to return again, except for occasional visits. (Aruban natives – plus all Netherland Antilles states – have Dutch citizenship, sharing the same Dutch passport as the Kingdom of the Netherlands).
…
As for the Dutch Caribbean territories, even though they are no longer considered colonies, but rather constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, they are effectively just welfare states dependent on Amsterdam; and a feeder for low-cost labor in Holland. They are inconsequential within the Dutch sphere of influence. There are parasites not protégés!

We must do better!

On the other hand, there is Amsterdam, the capital and principal city for the Kingdom of the Netherlands; see Appendices.

Amsterdam is the capital and most populous city of the Netherlands with a population of 872,680[12] within the city proper, 1,558,755 in the urban area[5] and 2,480,394 in the metropolitan area.[9] Found within the province of North Holland,[13][14] Amsterdam is colloquially referred to as the “Venice of the North“, attributed by the large number of canals which form a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Amsterdam was founded at the Amstel, that was dammed to control flooding, and the city’s name derives from the Amstel dam.[15] Originating as a small fishing village in the late 12th century, Amsterdam became one of the most important ports in the world during the Dutch Golden Age of the 17th century, and became the leading centre for finance and trade.[16] In the 19th and 20th centuries, the city expanded and many new neighbourhoods and suburbs were planned and built.

Amsterdam’s main attractions include its historic canals, the Rijksmuseum, the Van Gogh Museum, the Stedelijk Museum, Hermitage Amsterdam, the Concertgebouw, the Anne Frank House, the Scheepvaartmuseum, the Amsterdam Museum, the Heineken Experience, the Royal Palace of Amsterdam, Natura Artis Magistra, Hortus Botanicus Amsterdam, NEMO, the red-light district and many cannabis coffee shops. It drew more than 5 million international visitors in 2014.[17] The city is also well known for its nightlife and festival activity; with several of its nightclubs (Melkweg, Paradiso) among the world’s most famous. Primarily known for its artistic heritage, elaborate canal system and narrow houses with gabled façades; well-preserved legacies of the city’s 17th-century Golden Age. These characteristics are arguably responsible for attracting millions of Amsterdam’s visitors annually. Cycling is key to the city’s character, and there are numerous bike paths.

The Amsterdam Stock Exchange is considered the oldest “modern” securities market stock exchange in the world. As the commercial capital of the Netherlands and one of the top financial centres in Europe, Amsterdam is considered an alpha world city by the Globalization and World Cities (GaWC) study group. The city is also the cultural capital of the Netherlands.[18] Many large Dutch institutions have their headquarters in the city, including: the Philips conglomerate, AkzoNobel, Booking.com, TomTom, and ING.[19] Moreover, many of the world’s largest companies are based in Amsterdam or have established their European headquarters in the city, such as leading technology companies Uber, Netflix and Tesla.[20] In 2012, Amsterdam was ranked the second best city to live in by the Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU)[21] and 12th globally on quality of living for environment and infrastructure by Mercer.[22] The city was ranked 4th place globally as top tech hub in the Savills Tech Cities 2019 report (2nd in Europe),[23] and 3rd in innovation by Australian innovation agency 2thinknow in their Innovation Cities Index 2009.[24] The Port of Amsterdam is the fifth largest in Europe.[25] The KLM hub and Amsterdam’s main airport: Schiphol, is the Netherlands’ busiest airport as well as the third busiest in Europe and 11th busiest airport in the world.[26] The Dutch capital is considered one of the most multicultural cities in the world, with at least 177 nationalities represented.[27]

…

Diversity and immigration
Amsterdam experienced an influx of religions and cultures after the Second World War. With 180 different nationalities,[138] Amsterdam is home to one of the widest varieties of nationalities of any city in the world.[139] The proportion of the population of immigrant origin in the city proper is about 50%[140] and 88% of the population are Dutch citizens.[141]

Amsterdam has been one of the municipalities in the Netherlands which provided immigrants with extensive and free Dutch-language courses, which have benefited many immigrants.[142]

Economy – Tourism
Amsterdam is one of the most popular tourist destinations in Europe, receiving more than 5.34 million international visitors annually, this is excluding the 16 million day-trippers visiting the city every year.[171] The number of visitors has been growing steadily over the past decade. This can be attributed to an increasing number of European visitors. Two-thirds of the hotels are located in the city’s centre.[172] Hotels with 4 or 5 stars contribute 42% of the total beds available and 41% of the overnight stays in Amsterdam. The room occupation rate was 85% in 2017, up from 78% in 2006.[173][174] The majority of tourists (74%) originate from Europe. The largest group of non-European visitors come from the United States, accounting for 14% of the total.[174] Certain years have a theme in Amsterdam to attract extra tourists.
…
Source: Retrieved December 12, 2020 from: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amsterdam

Why such a sharp difference between the actuality of Aruba and that of Amsterdam?

  • Aruba appears in crisis; Amsterdam is thriving – one of the best cities in the world.
  • People cannot wait to get out of one, while people are striving (lining up, begging & petitioning) to get in to the other.

So exactly what is the difference? Heart.

The Go Lean book associates the “heart” with Community Ethos, defined above. The fact is that no one, individual or community can forge change without first changing the hear of community ethos. This was vividly explained in the same Page 10 of the Go Lean book. See this  excerpt:

Change is not easy …

Just ask anyone attempting to quit smoking. Not only are there physiological challenges, but psychological ones as well, to the extent that it can be stated with no uncertainty that “change begins in the head”. In psycho-therapy the approach to forge change for an individual is defined as “starting in the head (thoughts, visions), penetrating the heart (feelings, motivations) and then finally manifesting in the hands (actions). This same body analogy is what is purported in this book for how the Caribbean is to embrace change – following this systematic flow:

  • Head Plans, models and constitutions
  • Heart Community Ethos
  • Hands Actions, Reboots, and Turn-arounds

What is the community ethos of Amsterdam … that allows them to strive despite internal and external challenges?

Liberalism in the Netherlands started as an anti-monarchical effort spearheaded by the Dutch statesman Thorbecke, who almost single-handedly wrote the 1848 Constitution of the Netherlands that turned the country into a constitutional monarchy.

In contemporary politics, there are both left and right-wing parties that refer to themselves as “liberal“, with the former more often espousing social liberalism and the latter more often espousing classical liberalism. A common characteristic of these parties that they are nominally irreligious, in contrast to the traditionally dominant and still popular Christian democracy.[1]

That is it!

Liberalism or “live and let live”. (Note: This commentary is not advocating for free-for-all sex or drugs).

Amsterdam is known for its liberal views toward social issues (recreational drugs, prostitution, same-sex marriage and euthanasia) while the Caribbean member-states are known for its dogmatic, judgmental and intolerant society. Yet we wonder why people are fleeing one place and seeking refuge in the other. There is no need to wonder.

Notice that one of the attributes of Amsterdam liberalism is their tendency towards being irreligious. That refers to:

The absence, indifference to, or rejection of religion.[1]

Considering the full theme of this blog-commentary series, we see that religious indifference is the challenge. It was religious expansion – Christianity Christendom  – that motivated the exploration, conquest and colonization of the New World, and apparently that initial indoctrination never subsided. That Christian Community Ethos that was embedded then was dogmatic, judgmental and intolerant, thusly uninviting, where as the irreligious attribute was/is indifference.

So we ask these questions to those of you in the Netherlands Antilles, and by extension, to all of the Caribbean:

  • What do you want to be when you grow up?
  • Do you want to be successful and progressive and prosperous like Amsterdam?
  • Do you want to compete with Amsterdam to provide those with a choice the option to prosper here where they are planted?
  • Or do you want to continue with the status quo and continue to watch the decline in your society?

To even approach the position of answering these questions, our Caribbean member-states must be prepared to work together – in a more perfect union – to foster a better homeland. We must serve and protect. Human Rights should only be the floor; we must be prepared to build upon a strong foundation and reach great heights. Reform and transform …

We have addressed this theme before.

This Go Lean movement has previously detailed many related issues and advocacies for reforming and transforming the Caribbean member-states; consider this sample of previous blog-commentaries:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20573 Remembering and Remediating Our History – The Need to Reform
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20567 Transforming our Toxic Environments to Make the Caribbean Great
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20561 Embracing ‘Diversity & Inclusion’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20292 Advocating for Empathy – How? Conscientizing on VIDEO
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=20072 Rise from the Ashes – We now know Liberalism is Better than Fascism
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19833 The Need to Reform – Hypocrisy cancels out Law-and-Order
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19572 Master Class – How to reform and transform the Economy & Society
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19051 Forging Change – By Building Momentum
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=11224 ‘Loose Lips Sink Ships’ – Fanatical Theologians Undermine Progress
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=10513 Transforming ‘Money’ Countrywide – A Model for the new Caribbean
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7991 Transformations: Caribbean Postal Union – Delivering the Future
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5695 Reforming, Repenting, Forgiving and Reconciling the Past

If we know where the destination is and we have the urgent need to get there, why wait and waste time proceeding there?

The European Netherlands have always been ahead of us in the Caribbean, but eventually everyone else catches up. Consider the example of universal suffrage: One Man / One Woman / One Vote.

The US reached that destination in 1920 (with racial caveats that weren’t corrected until the Voting Rights Act of 1964):

  • The British granted that right in 1918.
  • Many Caribbean member-states waited and wasted valuable time, capital and people and didn’t reach the same destination until 1961.
  • When did the Netherlands grant this right? 1919; yet they did not allow the same right to their Caribbean colonies until 1949.

Surely, we do not still wonder why the Caribbean territories of the Netherlands – and other colonial legacies – linger influx when it comes to progress and development compared to their First World counterparts?

The Long Train of Abuses ... continues to ride.

Why wait and endure more unnecessary misery? The answer is a progressive liberalism that the European colonial host already enjoy – live and let live; think Amsterdam. This goal is within view; we should reach out and grab it. The Bible provides the guidance to:

9  Strip off the old personalityb with its practices, 10  and clothe yourselves with the new personalityc , which through*  accurate knowledge is being made new according to the image of the One who created it.- Colossians 3:9, 10 NWT

We know what the “garment of truth” looks like.

We hereby urge all stakeholders – in the Caribbean and the Diaspora or decision-makers in the Host Countries  – to lean-in to this Way Forward for societal progress in the Caribbean; this is the quest of the Go Lean roadmap. This is our plan to make our regional 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 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.

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 A VIDEO – What’s the deal with Amsterdam’s “liberal culture”? – https://vimeo.com/189429665

What’s the deal with Amsterdam’s “liberal culture”? from Eric Maddox on Vimeo.

Posted October 29, 2016 – In September 2016 students in Amsterdam and Beirut shared a Virtual Dinner together, discussed politics, the refugee crisis, Amsterdam’s reputation as a live-and-let-live city, and the delicate coexistence of different groups and ideologies in Lebanon. At the end of the discussion each group asked their partners on the other end of the virtual table a question to take to the streets of their communities an pose to everyday people.

This film presents the results of the Amsterdam team’s effort to address the question given to them from Lebanon. It is the 3rd of the three short films (2 from Lebanon and one from Amsterdam) completed by our teams in both countries. The project was sponsored by The Embassy of The Netherlands in Lebanon, and completed in collaboration with Unite Lebanon Youth Project.

This film focusses on Amsterdam. Our co-participants in The Netherlands walked around the city asking people of all backgrounds, a question that had been given to us by our co-participants in Lebanon:

“What does Amsterdam’s liberal culture mean to you?”

The Virtual Dinner Guest Project is a production of Open Roads Media, an Amsterdam based nonprofit with a global focus on putting the media narrative in the hands of the people and transforming conflict through direct engagement and creative collaboration that educates a global audience:

openroadsmedia.org/

You can also follow our progress and our snapshots, for this and previous projects, on social media:

Facebook: Open Roads Media
Twitter: @VirtualDinner
Instagram: Virtual Dinner

————————–

Appendix B VIDEO –  Amsterdam, the Liberal City ​– https://youtu.be/R5mFxBkMorQ

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See related VIDEO: https://youtu.be/Ufm1GP77bL4

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Long Train of Abuses: Overseas Masters – Cannot See Overseas

Posted on December 7, 2020 in Ethos, Government, Locations, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

What is the weather right now in Amsterdam, London, Paris and/or Washington DC?

Do you know? Does it even matter?

Chances are, the people in those cities also do not think of the specificities of our weather in the Caribbean. They might think it is warm in the winter and hot in the summer, but they may not understand the flooding-drought cycles, the humidity or the pervasive threat of tropical cyclones: Hurricanes.

They do not know … and may not care.

This is the alarming dangers of having Overseas Masters; they may not appreciate the need or landscape for local efficiencies in our daily stewardship. They may not care about the details and thusly, may not even allow the audience for us to enunciate the challenges of our problems or the solutions. They may even veto regulations and measures on our end that are best practices because they might violate some political “day-dream” on their end.

The concern may be trivial … or it may be life-or-death. This issue is just another scenario where there is a Long Train of Abuse for colonial pawns … compared to their imperial-host counterparts.

Here is an example of trivial:

Imagine this scenario …

… a Group Purchasing Agreement for Coast Guard boats is vetoed because a different manufacturer offers a better discount on their boats and snow removal equipment all bundled together.

This is our reality in the Caribbean. The need for us to deploy the best local governing strategy, tactic and implementation have never been greater, yet our hands may be tied for our own self-determination.

Now for an example approaching life-or-death. See this story below from Martinique in the French Caribbean. This is the grave matter of environmental poisoning, with a chemical not allowed in Metropolitan France but tolerated in the French Antilles. Grasp the summary from this excerpt:

“… the issue is how overseas territories get treated; there’s contempt, distance, condescension, lack of respect.”

Say it ain’t so!

See the full news article here, as published by the BBC:

Title: The Caribbean islands poisoned by a carcinogenic pesticide
By: Tim Whewell, BBC News, Martinique

“First we were enslaved. Then we were poisoned.” That’s how many on Martinique see the history of their French Caribbean island that, to tourists, means sun, rum, and palm-fringed beaches. Slavery was abolished in 1848. But today the islanders are victims again – of a toxic pesticide called chlordecone that’s poisoned the soil and water and been linked to unusually high rates of prostate cancer.

“They never told us it was dangerous,” Ambroise Bertin says. “So people were working, because they wanted the money. We didn’t have any instructions about what was, and wasn’t, good. That’s why a lot of people are poisoned.” He’s talking about chlordecone, a chemical in the form of a white powder that plantation workers were told to put under banana trees, to protect them from insects.

Ambroise did that job for many years. Later, he got prostate cancer, a disease that is commoner on Martinique and its sister French island of Guadeloupe than anywhere else in the world. And scientists blame chlordecone, a persistent organic pollutant related to DDT. It was authorised for use in the French West Indies long after its harmful effects became widely known.

“They used to tell us: don’t eat or drink anything while you’re putting it down,” Ambroise, now 70, remembers. But that’s the only clue he and other workers in Martinique’s banana plantations in the 1970s, 80s and early 90s had about the possible danger. Few if any were told to wear gloves or masks. Now, many have suffered cancer and other illnesses.

Chlordecone is an endocrine disrupter, meaning it can affect hormonal systems.

One of the world’s leading experts on the chemical, Prof Luc Multigner, of Rennes University in France, says epidemiological studies have shown increased risk of premature births and increased risk of adverse brain development in children at the exposure levels people in Martinique and Guadeloupe face through contaminated food consumption.

He also says: “There is enough toxicological and experimental data to conclude that chlordecone is carcinogenic.”

Following a detailed study Prof Multigner and colleagues conducted on Guadeloupe in 2010, he estimates chlordecone is responsible for about 5-10% of prostate cancer cases in the French West Indies, amounting to between 50 to 100 new cases per year, out of a population of 800,000.

Chlordecone stays in the soil for decades, possibly for centuries. So more than 20 years after the chemical ceased to be used, much of the land on Martinique cannot be used for growing vegetables, even though bananas and other fruit on trees are safe.

Rivers and coastal waters are also contaminated, which means many fishermen cannot work. And 92% of Martinicans have traces of chlordecone in their blood.

“You try to have a healthy kind of life. So maybe you will limit the effects of the poison. But you are not sure,” says historian Valy Edmond-Mariette, aged 31. “My friends and I were asking ourselves: do we really want children? Because if we give them breast milk, maybe they will have chlordecone in their blood. And I think nobody should be asking themselves this kind of question, because it’s awful.”

Production of chlordecone was stopped in the United States – where it was marketed as Kepone – as far back as 1975, after workers at a factory producing it in Virginia complained of uncontrollable shaking, blurred vision and sexual problems. In 1979, the World Health Organization classed the pesticide as potentially carcinogenic.

But in 1981 the French authorities authorised chlordecone for use in banana plantations in the French West Indies – and even though it was finally banned in 1990, growers lobbied for – and got – permission to carry on using stocks until 1993.

That’s why – for many Martinicans – chlordecone stirs up painful historical memories. “A lot of people talk about chlordecone like a new kind of slavery,” says Valy, whose own ancestors were enslaved. For two centuries, until 1848, Martinique was a colony that depended on the production of sugar by enslaved people. And in the late 20th Century, some of the big banana growers who used chlordecone were the direct descendants of those slave-owning sugar exporters, part of a small white minority known as the békés.

“Those are still the same group of people who have uncontested domination of the land,” says Guilaine Sabine, activist in a grassroots organisation called Zero Chlordecone Zero Poison. As well as campaigning for free blood tests for everyone on the island, members of the group have taken part in a new wave of protests over the last year aiming to draw attention to businesses that activists say have profited from the production and use of toxic pesticides. The demonstrations have been small, and some protesters have been convicted of violence against the police. But they reflect wider anger over the slow pace of France’s response to the chlordecone catastrophe.

It was only in 2018 – after more than 10 years of campaigning by French Caribbean politicians – that President Emmanuel Macron accepted the state’s responsibility for what he called “an environmental scandal”. He said France had suffered “collective blindness” over the issue. A law to create a compensation fund for agricultural workers has now been passed. But payouts haven’t started yet.

Martinique is an integral part of France, but one of the island’s MPs, Serge Letchimy, says it would never have taken the state so many years to react if there had been pollution on the same scale in Brittany, for example, or elsewhere in European France. “The issue is how overseas territories get treated. There’s contempt, distance, condescension, lack of respect.”

Prof Multigner says the original documents of the official body that authorised use of the pesticide in 1981 have disappeared for unknown reasons, hampering attempts to investigate how the decision was taken.

But the state’s representative on Martinique, Prefect Stanislas Cazelles, insists there was no discrimination against the islanders.

“The Republic is on the side of the oppressed, of the weakest here, just as in the European part of France,” he says.

The state is working to find ways to decontaminate the land – some scientists think chlordecone can potentially be biodegraded quite quickly – and ensure there is no trace of the pesticide in the food chain. And the prefect hopes the independent commission that will judge compensation claims will generally rule in favour of former farm workers who say they are victims of the pesticide.

Ambroise, who worked with chlordecone for so many years, had an operation to remove his cancer in 2015. But he still suffers from thyroid disease and other problems that may be connected to chlordecone’s known effects on the hormonal system.

Meanwhile the historian, Valy, had blood cancer when she was just 25. Her doctor does not think it was due to chlordecone. But Valy says no-one can be sure.

Worrying about the effects of the pesticide, she says, can be exhausting. “But in the end, you can’t control everything. You have to admit that to some extent, you’re poisoned, so you just deal with it.”  😐

Source: Posted November 20, 2020; Retrieved December 6, 2020 from:  https://www.bbc.com/news/stories-54992051?fbclid=IwAR06kJWJa0snsL2On46rTiCpNKfxOFEhyF_G3uiyXKUk9Lpsp9hVMZjl60Q

This is not theoretical; this is the Long Train of Abuses we have had to endure here in the Caribbean.

This is the continuation of the monthly Teaching Series from the movement behind the 2013 book Go Lean…Caribbean. The book presents issues that are germane to Caribbean life and culture and how to address them: problems and solutions. For this month of December 2020, we are looking at the Long Train of Abuses that could-would-should move our people to change, to reform and transform. This is entry 2-of-6; this one asserts that a system of Overseas Masters is inherently flawed as a strategy for governance in a local community – “they” cannot see overseas.

  • Too many things can go wrong.
  • Too many things have gone wrong.

These “gone wrong’ considerations are among the lessons for this Teaching Series this month. See the full catalog of the series this month:

  1. Long Train of Abuses: Enough Already – Colonialism Be Gone!
  2. Long Train of Abuses: Overseas Masters – Cannot See Overseas
  3. Long Train of Abuses: Religious Leadership in Government – Reconciling Trump
  4. Long Train of Abuses: Religious Character in Society – Human Rights
  5. Long Train of Abuses: Dutch Hypocrisy – Liberal Amsterdam vs Conservative Antilles
  6. Long Train of Abuses: Puerto Rico – “Take the Heat” or “Get out of the Kitchen”

This submission looks specifically at an example in the French Antilles. But the foregoing example of French mis-management is just another case of “For Export Only”-labeled products. For stakeholders in the host country, their overseas territory is far enough to be considered for “exports”. This is why the Caribbean region must no longer endure these Long Train of Abuses.

The Go Lean book, serving as a roadmap for the introduction and implementation of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU), asserts that Caribbean stakeholders must instantiate the technocratic security and governing apparatus to deliver in the Caribbean for the people of the Caribbean; for us by us. Our motivation is economic as well. Imagine our “trade” prospects.

In the foregoing news story, the threat on locally-grown produce was exposed because of the contaminating agents still in the soil in Martinique. Imagine a neighboring Caribbean island – i.e. Dominica – consuming fresh produce from Martinique. This is why any effort for a Caribbean Single Market must be coupled with a Security-Public-Safety apparatus as well.

Enough already! We do not want to be just an Export or Foreign Market. No, we want to be considered neighbors; we must protect each other.

We have addressed this theme before. Consider this sample of previous blog-commentaries that highlighted the roles and responsibilities to foster regional trade and regional harmony:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=19570 European Role Model: Not when ‘Push’ comes to ‘Shove’
Under normal conditions, the EU boast Free Movement of people and universal protections of civil rights in every jurisdiction. But, now something has broken that European tranquility, the COVID-19 pandemic.The end-result may be closed borders, banned exports of critical supplies and withholding of humanitarian aid. That is “me first” nationalism, instead of the best-practice of interdependence.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=18834 A Lesson in History: Free Trade Agreement of the Americas
Free Trade would allow for all 30 member-states to have a tariff-free trading environment. We need to consider this at least to fulfill our Food Security needs.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=17282 Way Forward – For Independence: Territory Realities
A roadmap for a “bigger organization” tied to the geographical neighborhood, as opposed to the colonial legacy with “overseas masters” up to 8,000 miles away.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=15567 Caribbean Unity? Need French Antilles
There must be a regional integration that will integrate the entire region. Yes, this effort posits that any integration without the French territories is like building a skyscraper on a shaky foundation. What a skyscraper really needs is: Bedrock, Baby! The Caribbean Union needs all French territories.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=10554 Welcoming the French in Formal Integration Efforts
The islands of Martinique, Guadeloupe, Saint Martin and Saint Barthélemy want to do more with their tropical neighbors; they want to confederate, collaborate and convene on different issues related to community development and nation-building. The rest of the Caribbean should embrace this invitation.
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=10043 Caribbean Integration Plan for Greater Prosperity
Greater prosperity can be had in the Caribbean only by embracing regional integration. A new model of interdependence and regional integration is far better than the status quo. Like the African proverb says:”If you want to go fast, go alone. If you want to go far, go together”.

“For export only” …

… just this label seems to be the catalyst for investigating the possibility of abuse. See this related story in this VIDEO here:

VIDEO – For Export Only – Pesticides (1981) – https://youtu.be/CPFLPGL_Lrg



Concord Media
Posted August 6, 2015 – Available to buy at: http://www.concordmedia.org.uk/produc… or buy or rent and watch now on: https://vimeo.com/ondemand/forexporto…

The export of pesticides banned in the West, to third world countries, and the disastrous effects of this policy.

Made in 1981 this film reflects the cultural attitudes of the country and language of the time it was made. The issues raised are timeless. The film quality may not be to modern standards.

Distributed by Concord Media
Website: http://concordmedia.org.uk
Twitter: http://twitter.com/ConcordMedia
Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/ConcordMedia59
Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/concordmedia/vod_pages

In general, it is no longer acceptable for “imperial countries” to still own colonies – the inherent threats were manifested in World War I and World War II. In the post WWII reconciliations, it was frown upon to perpetuate colonial ecosystems. To navigate around such a Eliminate Colonies mandate, the Republic of France simply declared their Caribbean territories as a member-sub-state of France, an Overseas Department.

These initiatives proved to just be empty gestures …

So now, while “on paper” these 4 Caribbean islands (and French Guiana too) are supposed to be part of First World France, it is irrefutable that France treats them simply as Third World territories. For example, as depicted in the foregoing news story of shipping and tolerating dangerous chemicals that had previously been banned in Metropolitan France.  🙁

This is a continuation of the Long Train of Abuses.

So this is our urging for all Caribbean member-states of French heritage; (plus British, Dutch and American):

Get out … now!

We hereby urge all stakeholders to lean-in to an alternative, a better Way Forward, this Go Lean roadmap. This is our plan to make our regional homeland a better place to live, work and play.

Yes, we can. Yes, we must! 🙂

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 – 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, including piracy and other forms of terrorism, 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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Way Forward – For Independence: Territory Realities

Posted on April 23, 2019 in Government, Locations, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

Notwithstanding indigenous Amerindian cultures, the Caribbean represents the oldest civilizations in the New World. Columbus made his New World discovery here in the Caribbean:

The island of San Salvador in the Bahamas in 1492 …

… and established the first European settlement here:

Santo Domingo, in today’s Dominican Republic in 1496.

So, being the oldest civilization, the expectation should be that we would be the most matured in the hemisphere.

We would be Grown Up … by now?!

Far from it! For many of our Caribbean territories, “grown-up maturity” is far from the truth; they are still dependent colonies. In fact, there are 30 member-states – grouping the Netherland Antilles (N.A.) as 1 member-state – that identify as the political Caribbean. Of that number, 18 of them are considered Dependent Territories without full autonomy to determine their economic, security and governing deliveries for their communities; (this 18 counts each N.A. island).

See this list of “Dependent” territories in the Caribbean:

Member-State Legal Status
Anguilla British Overseas Territory = BOT
Bermuda BOT
British Virgin Islands BOT
Cayman Islands BOT
Guadeloupe French Department
Martinique French Department
Montserrat BOT
Netherlands Antilles
Aruba Netherlands Constituent
Bonaire Netherlands Constituent
Curaçao Netherlands Constituent
Saba Netherlands Constituent
Sint Eustatius Netherlands Constituent
Sint Maarten Netherlands Constituent
Puerto Rico US Territory
Saint Barthélemy French Department
Saint Martin French Department
Turks and Caicos Islands BOT
US Virgin Islands US Territory

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_the_Caribbean#Independence

It is because of this legal status for almost half of the member-states that there is definitely the need for this region to finally grow up and be mature!

The 2013 book Go Lean … Caribbean asserted that the needed maturity can still manifest without changing the legal status from Dependent to Independent territories!

For a long time, right after World War II – 1948 and later, independence was all the rage. People in many communities actually thought that independence was the panacea for their ills in Caribbean communities; (there are even some who want independence for Puerto Rico). But after 70 years and 16 individual independence movements, it is a fallacy to think the independence is the solution. No, it is our conclusion that the best practice for Caribbean prosperity, the Way Forward, is Interdependence … not Independence.

Yes, there is the need for these dependent territories to align with a “bigger organization” structure for better deliveries of the Social Contract – where citizens surrender some of their freedoms and submit to the authority of the State in exchange for protection of remaining natural and legal rights. But the Go Lean book presents the roadmap that this “bigger organization” should be tied to the geographical neighborhood, as opposed to some colonial legacy with an “overseas master” up to 8,000 miles away. The book details this (Page 96) as the Step One (Year 1) of a 5-Year Plan:

Assemble
… this roadmap pursues an assembly of these different institutions and then to supplement them with the creation of new super-national organizations. This approach allows the CU to “stand on the shoulders” of previous efforts and then reach greater heights.

This initial phase entails incorporating all the existing regional organizations – like the ACS and Caribbean Community (CariCom) into the umbrella organizations of the Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). These organizations include, (but are not limited to):

  • CariCom Secretariat – 22 Agencies – Appendix BA (Page 256)
  • French Overseas Territory
  • CariCom Office of Trade Negotiations
  • US Overseas Territory (Puerto Rico & US Virgin Islands) – See Appendix IA (Page 278)
  • British Commonwealth / Overseas Territory
  • Netherlands Overseas Territory
  • Association of Caribbean States (ACS)
  • Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS)

As related in a previous blog-commentary …

… it is the assessment of this commentary that Independence is so overrated; rather than the independence, the call is for interdependence. A model of this desired interdependence is the inter-state cooperation in the European Union (EU).

Yes, the Europeans did it; they appointed “new guards“. The EU does not possess any sovereignty; that remains with the member-states. The EU is simply a confederacy; a deputized technocracy chartered for the purpose of delivering many of the Social Contract obligations better … than what used to be the norm of the individual states.

The Committee for the Nobel Prize for Peace agreed with this assessment in 2012 … and awarded the Nobel Prize to the EU for that year.

“They” did it; we can too!

For all the Overseas Territories in the Caribbean to embark on a course of action in emulation of the EU, we would be declaring that we too need to “appoint new guards” to make our homelands better places to live, work and play. The Go Lean book opens with the call for all of these 30 Caribbean member-states to make that declaration … for interdependence. This is pronounced early in the book, in the Declaration of Interdependence on Pages 10 thru 12:

Preamble: As the colonial history of our region was initiated to create economic expansion opportunities for our previous imperial masters, the structures of government instituted in their wake have not fostered the best systems for prosperity … . Despite this past, we thrust our energies only to the future, in adapting the best practices and successes of the societies of these previous imperial masters and recognizing the positive spirit of their intent and vow to learn from their past accomplishments and mistakes so as to optimize the opportunities for our own citizenry to create a more perfect bond of union.

… we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness; that to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed. That whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends … it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security. …
…
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.

This need for “new guards” have been detailed in many previous Go Lean blog-commentaries. Consider this sample:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16668 New Guards for Justice and Economics
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16364 New Guards for Technology Deployments
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16210 New Guards for Currency Management
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=16002 New Guards for Corporate Governance
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=15996 New Guards for Emergencies
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=15075 New Guards for e-Government
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14825 New Guards for Jobs
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=14480 New Guards for Mental Health
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13472 New Guards for Tertiary Education
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13321 New Guards for a “Pluralistic Democracy”
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=13063 New Guards for Civil and Gender Rights
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7789 New Guards for Global Trade
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=7601 New Guards for Caribbean Sovereign Debt
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6341 New Guards for Tourism Stewardship
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=6103 New Guards Against Deadly Threats

In summary, despite all these many words, the Way Forward for stewardship for the many European-and-American Overseas Territories in the Caribbean is simple: Interdependence among the regional neighbors, despite any language or colonial legacies. (This is the same that they did in Europe … and America; we must now do “it” here).

This is easier said than done. This is why there is the need for a detailed roadmap to provide the guidance – turn-by-turn directions – for this Way Forward. The 370 pages of the book Go Lean … Caribbean present the community ethos that must first be adopted to be successful in this endeavor; plus the many strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies that must be executed to forge collaboration and interdependence in this region. See the specific details from the book in these pages:

Implementation – Ways to Promote Independence Page 120
Planning – Ways to Model the EU Page 130
Planning – Lessons Learned from the West Indies Federation – Previous Interdependence Effort Page 135
Advocacy – Ways to Better Manage the Social Contract Page 170
Advocacy – Ways to Impact US Territories Page 244
Advocacy – Ways to Impact British Territories Page 245
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Dutch Territories Page 246
Advocacy – Ways to Impact French Territories Page 247

This commentary continues the consideration on the Way Forward for the full Caribbean and the individual member-states. This submission here focuses on the 18 member-states that are considered overseas territories. While their needs are the same as everyone, their organizational and governmental structures are different – they have only limited autonomy. Yet, there is a Way Forward. This is entry 8-of-9 for this April 2019 compilation of commentaries; (the list started as 3, grew dynamically to 6 and will finalized with 9). The full series of commentaries related to the Way Forward is presented as follows:

  1. Way Forward: Puerto Rico learns its “status” with America
  2. Way Forward: Virgin Islands – America’s youngest colony
  3. Way Forward: Bahamas – “Solutions White Paper” – An Inadequate Plan
  4. Way Forward: Jamaica: The need to reconcile the Past
  5. Way Forward: Caribbean Media Strategy & Deliveries
  6. Way Forward: Strategy for Justice: Special Prosecutors et al
  7. Way Forward: Strategy for Energy – ‘Trade’ Winds
    ———
  8. Way Forward: Strategy for Independence – Territory Realities
  9. Way Forward: “Whatever it takes” – Life Imitating Art

This series posits that “no man is an island” and further that “no island is an island”; this is the epitome of interdependence. The benefits of a leveraged confederacy in the Caribbean region is a win-win for the people of the Caribbean and their overseas masters burdened with their care.

The Caribbean now wants to grow up and take care of our own affairs. Besides, we can do it better with local oversight to local problems. The label of Overseas Territory is still just a different name for the old practice of:

colonialism.

That is still a flawed concept  – assuming White racial supremacy – with flawed prospects for future success; this is true if its colonialism in the Caribbean, Asia and/or Africa. We reap what we sow; we cannot expect to plant weeds and harvest wheat. See this analysis addresses in this VIDEO here:

VIDEO – Colonialism’s Impact on Africa – https://youtu.be/xhnG8JbBegA

Big Think
Published on Apr 23, 2012 – The journalist says colonialism was “short enough to destroy leadership in Africa but not long enough to replace it with anything else.”

Notice his hint as to how Internet & Communications Technologies bring New Hope…

Notice his hint on how a repatriated Diaspora brings New Hope …

Everyone in the Caribbean – citizens, institutions and dependent member-states and  independent member-states – are hereby urged to lean-in to this Go Lean roadmap. The end-result is conceivable, believable and achievable: a better homeland 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 – economics, security and governance – must be a regional pursuit. This quest was also an early motivation for the roadmap, as pronounced in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 12 – 13):

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.

xxiii. Whereas many countries in our region are dependent Overseas Territories of imperial powers, the systems of governance can be instituted on a regional and local basis, rather than requiring oversight or accountability from distant masters far removed from their subjects of administration. The Federation must facilitate success in autonomous rule by sharing tools, systems and teamwork within the geographical region.

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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Tourism Stewardship — What’s Next?

Posted on September 15, 2015 in Economics, Government, Industries, Strategy

Go Lean Commentary

Let’s learn from history…

The industry of travel agencies did not always exist … in modern times. It emerged as transportation options standardized (rail, steamships, and airplanes) and became more convenient. The transportation companies did not need travel agencies; they only acquiesced to the industry stakeholders as a matter of convenience. According to the short history of travel agency pioneer Thomas Cook in Appendix A …

[they] agreed to make a permanent arrangement with him provided he found the passengers.

The book Go Lean…Caribbean calls for the elevation of Caribbean society, to re-focus, re-boot, and optimize all the engines of commerce so as to make the Caribbean a better place to live, work and play.  The category of “play” covers the full scope of tourism, which is the primary economic driver for our Caribbean region; the book estimates 80 million visitors among the region. (Since that number includes cruise passengers that may visit multiple Caribbean islands on one itinerary, each port is counted separately; without cruise passengers, a figure of 68 – 69 million is perhaps more accurate).

Stewardship 6This commentary is a consideration of tourism, not travel. Tourism is a subset of the travel eco-system, so any Agent of Change in the world of travel must be carefully considered on tourism, on Caribbean tourism.

The World Tourism Organization defines tourists or tourism as people “traveling to and staying in places outside their usual environment for not more than one consecutive year for leisure, business and other purposes”.[1]

Tourism is now a popular global leisure activity. Tourism can be domestic or international, and international tourism has both incoming and outgoing implications on a country’s balance of payments. Today, tourism is a major source of income for many countries, and affects the economy of both the source and host countries, in some cases being of vital importance.

Tourism suffered as a result of a strong economic slowdown of the late-2000s recession, between the second half of 2008 and the end of 2009, and the outbreak of the H1N1 influenza virus,[2][3] but slowly recovered. International tourism receipts (the travel item in the balance of payments) grew to US$1.03 trillion in 2011, corresponding to an increase in real terms of 3.8% from 2010.[4] International tourist arrivals surpassed the milestone of 1 billion tourists globally for the first time in 2012,[5] the same year in which China became the largest spender in international tourism globally with US$102 billion, surpassing Germany and United States. China and emerging markets such as Russia and Brazil had significantly increased their spending over the previous decade.[6]
Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tourism

The Go Lean book considers these Agents of Change (Page 57) that have dynamically affected the Caribbean economic eco-systems:

  • Technology
  • Globalization
  • Aging Diaspora
  • Climate Change

This first one, technology, has had a most shocking effect on this travel/tourism industry. We can conclude that the days of Thomas Cook are over. It is no longer convenient for tourism industry stakeholders (transportation lines, resort properties, etc.) to acquiesce to travel agents; they are no longer needed to find passengers-guests-travelers-tourists.

(The industry for travel agents have effectively disappeared).

Technology, the Internet-Communications-Technology (ICT) in particular has furnished alternative and better options for travel enterprises to find passengers-guests-travelers-tourists; see sample website, Booking.com, in the VIDEO in the Appendix C below. (These websites also provide better options/prices for consumers). Travel agents are now inconsequential.

The same too with politicians leading the Tourism stewardship!

The national stewards of Caribbean tourism must now transform for this Agent of Change. Instead of “schmoozing” travel agents to incentivize bookings, it is necessary to master Search Engine Optimizations (SEO), website design, social media outreach, etc..

The Caribbean member-states do not need “Ministers/Secretaries of Tourism” or Ambassadors of governments, they need Computer Programmers! More exactly, the region needs multi-lingual computer programmers, as the foregoing World Tourism Organization quote relates that much of the growth in tourism numbers are from the emerging markets of China, Russia, Brazil, etc. (In Economics, these countries are grouped B.R.I.C.S. for Brazil, Russia, India, China & South Africa).

Technology and Globalization! The stewardship of Caribbean tourism must truly adapt, evolve and transform to keep pace.

How is the Caribbean tourism industry doing in this regard? There is the case-in-point of Aruba. See the news article here:

Title: Why Aruba Tourism is Booming — And What’s Next
Sub-title: The Dutch Caribbean’s tourism hub is growing. Quickly.
By: Caribbean Journal staff

Stewardship 1Plainly, tourism in Aruba is booming. The island saw a 16.2 percent increase in stayover visitor arrivals in the first half of 2015, making it the Caribbean’s fastest-growing destination in the first half of 2015, according to data from the Caribbean Tourism Organization. So what’s next for the island? To learn more, CJ caught up with Ronella Ronella Tjin Asjoe, CEO of the Aruba Tourism Authority.

What is the outlook for Aruba tourism and the forecast for the high season?

With each passing year, Aruba continues to see an increase in the number of stay-over visitors and visitor on-island spending. After receiving a record number of annual visitors in 2014 (1.07 million), ATA set an aggressive goal for an 11.5 percent increase in 2015, as well as a 4 percent increase in tourism receipts, and is on track to surpass those goals. The overall ADR is projected to grow by 5-10 percent in 2015, and RevPar is projected to grow by a similar rate. With increased airlift, island-wide hotel renovations and new projects in the works, coupled with ATA’s innovative digital marketing strategies, Aruba’s tourism product improves annually — resulting in improved performance results year over year.

What new initiatives are there for Aruba Tourism Authority?

Aruba Tourism Authority (ATA) has launched a new interactive experience allowing visitors to share their perfect Aruba vacation before ever stepping foot on our popular Caribbean island. The Happiness Builder is a content-rich planning experience where travelers can explore nearly 100 videos featuring adventure, relaxation, romance and cultural activities in Aruba. This dynamic and fully-immersive planning process — from choosing the video clips to picking an accompanying music track and personal message — results in a customized “Shortcut to Happiness” video that is easily sharable. As Aruba continues to evolve from both a product and marketing perspective, new and innovative tools like the Happiness Builder remain crucial to Aruba’s success as one of the most popular tourist destinations.

What are the largest challenges facing Aruba as a tourist destination?

Stewardship 2The World Tourism Council (WTTC) reports Aruba’s GDP is more reliant on travel and tourism than any other nation, relative to size, in the world. Tourism currently accounts for 88 percent of the nation’s GDP and only continues to increase. As such, Aruba must remain creative and digital-savvy to inspire consumers to visit and fully experience our island. Our target audience visits more than 20 websites before booking their vacation, so it is essential for us to maintain a presence throughout that process with a timely, persuasive message at each stage. By engaging the best strategists and leveraging targeted technologies, we can ensure our marketing dollars are spent effectively against desired consumers in-market for vacation travel.

What sort of new investments are being made in the public sector of Aruba as it relates to tourism?

As part of Aruba’s ongoing, $1 billion+ island revitalization and beautification project, the destination recently invested more than $100 million in significant hotel updates to enhance visitors’ experiences, with an additional $50 million planned for next year. The Aruba Airport Authority also fully renovated the Reina Beatrix International Airport, introducing new amenities and services true to the One happy island brand. This includes an airport wide Wi-Fi upgrade, installation of APC and ABC Kiosks, three new F&B concepts and an additional 150 seats, and an update to the airport arrival hall and VIP lounges. Airport investments between $100-150 million are planned in the upcoming years, as traffic continues to reach new heights

Are there large renovations, new projects or new hotels are on the horizon?

In addition to the island-wide resort renovations, Aruba has new hotels in the works. The city of San Nicolas continues to be a large focus for ATA and the government, as it continues to evolve as a cultural center, with new museums slated in the coming years.

Tell us a little about upcoming Aruba events and festivals. Which of these can you recommend?

Fall is one of Aruba’s most eventful times of year, with countless culinary, cultural and musical festivals. Upcoming events include the Aruba International Film Festival, Caribbean Sea Jazz Festival and highly-anticipated, first annual Restaurant Week, Sept. 28-Oct. 9. Boasting 60 participating restaurants, Aruba is increasingly revered as the “Ultimate Sand Bar Island,” with 25+ bars/restaurants conveniently located on the water. Options range from casual decks overlooking the Caribbean sea to fine dining toes-in-the-sand establishments. Aruba’s new restaurant week offers food critics, wine connoisseurs, foodies and everyone in between the opportunity to explore Aruba’s culinary heritage.
Source: Caribbean Journal – Regional – News Site (Published September 13, 2015) – http://caribjournal.com/2015/09/13/why-aruba-tourism-is-booming-and-whats-next/

According to the foregoing news story/interview, the Tourism stewards in Aruba understand the significance of the technology/digital strategy for elevating this economic engine. Is this the case for the rest of the region? Hardly!

Stewardship 3Even still, it is obvious that the expertise and reach of the officials in Aruba is still limited; see previous blog-commentary here on the State of Aruban society. The book Go Lean…Caribbean and the underlying movement seeks to re-boot the strategies and tactics of tourism marketing for the entire Caribbean region. The book asserts Caribbean member-states must expand and optimize their tourism outreach but that the requisite investment of the resources (time, talent, treasuries) for this goal may be too big for any one Caribbean member-state (like Aruba) alone. 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). The book thereafter introduces the CU and provides a roadmap for its implementation into a Single Market for the Caribbean economy … and tourism marketing.

The goal of the CU is to bring the proper tools and techniques to the Caribbean region to optimize the stewardship of the economic, security and governing engines.  The book posits that the economy can be induced and spurred for continuous progress, with technocratic management and stewardship better than the status quo. While the goal of the roadmap is to pursue a diversification strategy, the reality is that tourism will continue to be the primary economic driver in the region for the foreseeable future. The publisher of the book Go Lean…Caribbean convenes the talents and skillsets of movers-and-shakers in electronic commerce so as to forge the best tools and techniques for this new ICT-based marketing.

According to the below Appendix B – Priceline and Appendix C – VIDEO, the world is operating under a different business model than previously familiar in the Caribbean. Truly the region needs programmers not politicians to shepherd tourism in the homeland.

Change has come to the travel industry. Just how do we optimize the marketing and management of our new products and services to elevate our economies?

This book Go Lean… Caribbean provides the needed details. Early in the book, the optimization and best-practices of regional tourism was highlighted as a reason the Caribbean region needed to unite, integrate and confederate. These pronouncements were included in the opening Declaration of Interdependence (Pages 11 – 14):

iv.  Whereas the natural formation of the landmass is in a tropical region, the flora and fauna allows for an inherent beauty that is enviable to peoples near and far. The structures must be strenuously guarded to protect and promote sustainable systems of commerce paramount to this reality.

vi.  Whereas the finite nature of the landmass of our lands limits the populations and markets of commerce, by extending the bonds of brotherhood to our geographic neighbors allows for extended opportunities and better execution of the kinetics of our economies through trade. This regional focus must foster and promote diverse economic stimuli.

viii.  Whereas the population size is too small to foster good negotiations for products and commodities from international vendors, the Federation must allow the unification of the region as one purchasing agent, thereby garnering better terms and discounts.

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.

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… In addition, the Federation must invigorate the enterprises related to existing industries like tourism… – 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.

The Go Lean… Caribbean book wisely details the community ethos to adopt to proactively facilitate the digital campaigns for the changed landscape of tourism marketing; plus the executions of the following strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies:

Community Ethos – Deferred Gratification Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principle – People Respond to Incentives Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Principle – Consequences of Choices Lie in the Future Page 21
Community Ethos – Job Multiplier Page 22
Community Ethos – Lean Operations Page 24
Community Ethos – Return on Investments (ROI) Page 24
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Future Page 26
Community Ethos – Ways to Foster Genius – Literary, Art and Music in Graphic Design Page 27
Community Ethos – Impact Research & Development – Including ICT Page 30
Community Ethos – Ways to Improve Sharing – Data / Social Network Page 35
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Greater Good Page 37
Strategy – Vision – Integrate Region in a Single Market Page 45
Strategy – Mission – Build and Foster Local Economic Engines Page 45
Strategy – Mission – Exploit the Benefits of Globalization in Trade-Tourism Page 46
Strategy – Agents of Change – Technology Page 57
Strategy – Agents of Change – Globalization Page 57
Tactical – Fostering a Technocracy Page 64
Tactical – Growing the Economy to $800 Billion – Trade and Globalization Page 70
Tactical – Website www.myCaribbean.gov for Caribbean stakeholders – Tourists Page 74
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Tourism Promotions and Administration Page 78
Implementation – Integrate All Caribbean Websites to www.myCaribbean.gov Portal Page 97
Implementation – Ways to Pay for Change Page 101
Implementation – Ways to Deliver Page 109
Implementation – Ways to Impact Social Media – www.myCaribbean.gov Portal Page 111
Planning – 10 Big Ideas – Cyber Caribbean Page 127
Planning – Ways to Make the Caribbean   Better Page 131
Planning – Ways to Better Manage Image – Digital Media Presence Page 133
Planning – Lessons Learned from 2008 – Tourism & Economy Went Bust Page 136
Planning – Lessons Learned from Egypt – Lack of Tourism Stewardship Page 143
Advocacy – Ways to Measure Progress – Mining www.myCaribbean.gov Portal Data Page 147
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Create Jobs Page 152
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Cooperatives Page 176
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Communications – Internet & Social Media Marketing Page 186
Advocacy – Ways to Enhance Tourism – Excess Inventory Marketing Page 190
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Events – Sharing Economy Page 191
Advocacy – Ways to Market Southern California Page 194
Advocacy – Ways to Foster Technology Page 197
Advocacy – Ways to Foster e-Commerce Page 198
Advocacy – Ways to Preserve Caribbean Heritage – Cyber-Caribbean Image/Media Page 218

The CU seeks to foster internet-communications-technologies to aid-and-abet tourism. This includes all supporting functions before, during and after visitors come to our shores. In fact the Go Lean roadmap considers the tourist, a stakeholder in this empowerment plan. These prime directives apply to them as well:

  • 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 protect the resultant economic engines, ensure public safety for stakeholders and marshal against economic crimes.
  • Improvement of Caribbean governance to support these engines.

Examine here how a technocratic effort can enhance the Caribbean tourism outreach online. See this How-To article:

Title: Template For Success: 5 Keys to Creating A Winning Social Media Plan

By: Stuart Leung, Guest Columnist from Salesforce.com

Stewardship 4With social networks becoming more and more ingrained in everyday business communication and gaining widespread acceptance as a marketing channel, your company needs to know how to connect with your consumer base.

So, do you have a plan around social media?

With dozens of social networks that each offer unique benefits, the natural inclination is to jump on every platform, but unless you have multiple social media managers, the most effective way to communicate is to prioritize and create a business plan around social. With a strategy, you can target your time and effort to not only show up to the social party, but build real relationships with your connections.

There is a difference between using social media, utilizing it correctly, and leveraging it for the needs and goals of your business. Studies indicate that 33% of consumers use social networks as a way they discover new brands, products or services, and if you’re not doing social media the right way, it’s really easy for a consumer to be put off and move on.

Perhaps your business has a Facebook page, but it isn’t engaging with your fans. There’s the corporate Twitter account, but it’s produced only 14 tweets in the last year. And does it make sense for your small business to be invested in Pinterest if the account has been dormant? Businesses jumping in without a plan happens more often than not because it’s simple to register with an email, choose a handle, and go through the motions.

Successful social media players have more than just a presence. They’ve not only developed a strong social media plan, but they also allot real resources to engage and grow their user base on each network.

With Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Google+, SlideShare, Pinterest, YouTube, Tumblr, and more, how do you choose which networks to plan around? It’s a common dilemma that faces thousands of business owners everyday.

Here are five important factors that will help not only develop a social media presence, but hopefully will open up new opportunities for business as well:

  1. Realistic Metrics for Social Media Success

In order to achieve success, you first need to define what success will look like on social media.

Take a critical look at how you use social media now. Has it been working for you? Are you able to see any growth as a result? Do you know how to measure that growth?

Now, ask yourself what it is that you want to accomplish. Common social media goals can be enhancing customer awareness, promoting staff accomplishments, and sharing information about your company. Whatever your end goals may be, try to break them down into easily definable and measurable objectives. Be specific when you do this, so that you’ll be able to see definitively what is moving you towards completing these objectives.

As you get more of a feel for what social marketing can achieve, and what you need it to do for you, you’ll be able to refine your goals and make them more realistic. Also, this is a great time to review your overall marketing plan as you look for ways to increase your social media presence.

  1. Active and Nurtured Community

Who is reaching out to you on social and is already, organically engaging with your brand? How can you nurture and grow that community in an authentic way that also supports your team’s overall marketing efforts?

What other methods could you use to connect with your audience, and how could you link your efforts to make them more effective? Define these personas and remember that they will determine your success or failure, so make sure that you know who they are, and how to best connect with them.

  1. Content and Promotion

The Internet is a dynamic and evolving creature, which means that the content that you create for your social media has to be dynamic as well.

A common pitfall among many organizations is not having enough fresh and interesting content for social media. Strive for content that is relevant, current, and genuinely applicable to your audience today.

Plan ahead and dedicate resources for your social media efforts. It’s critical to have a content calendar to organize when you’re going to generate content and manage when the content will be pushed out.

Will you have employees who will write it, or do you plan to use freelancers? Decide who will be creating the assignments and monitoring the quality of the work, and ensure that your social media plan not only allows for regular updates and posts, but speaks the language of that particular social network.

  1. Social Networks Relevant to Your Business

Focus on specific social media networks that will most help you attract and engage your audience.

This goes hand in hand with factor #2 above—the community you will be nurturing. How does your company want to connect with current and prospective customers. Is your brand voice personal or professional? Do you have resources for a two-way conversation, or will your strategy focus on broadcasting?

The demographics of your base are also important here. How old are they? What is their gender? Further defining your audience will greatly help you choose the social network that works best for your audience.

  1. Open and Transparent Communication

The open-forum format of social media means your company will benefit from direct communication with your customers. In all interactions with customers on social, authenticity and transparency is key.

Allow customers to use social media to share their feedback—show appreciation for positive feedback with positive responses, and address negative feedback head-on. Don’t make the mistake of deleting negative posts. Instead, show your customers that they’ve been heard, apologize and accept responsibility, and when possible, use feedback to improve how you do business.

Make sure that whomever is in charge of social media knows how to respond, and is working closely with your internal PR team to manage these inevitable situations.

Stewardship 5

Source: Forbes Magazine – National Business Weekly (Published September 3, 2014; retrieved September 15, 2015) –  http://www.forbes.com/sites/salesforce/2014/09/03/creating-winning-social-media-plan/

This foregoing article describes the heavy-lifting involved in optimizing the digital marketing efforts for the Caribbean touristic enterprises. This hard-work is worth the effort. The Returns-on-Investment is assured!

In previous Go Lean blogs, related points of the Agents of Change affecting tourism have been detailed; see sample here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5210 Cruise Ship Commerce – Getting Ready for Change
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4639 Tobago: A Model for Cruise Tourism
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3225 The need to optimize Caribbean aviation policies
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2571 Internet Commerce meets Sharing Economy: Airbnb
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1984 Casinos Failing Business Model within Tourism
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1943 The Future of Golf; Vital for Tourism
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=273 10 Things We Want from the US – # 2: Tourists
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=254 The need to enhance Tourism with “Air Lifts”
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=235 Tourism’s changing profile

This commentary has related the world of Thomas Cook the person, and reported that the business model he established has now passed on into history, just like him. The new players include entities like the Priceline Group and their series of companies – see Appendix – Priceline below. The stewardship of the past just simply no longer applies today.

It is what it is!

The Caribbean must lean-in to this new tourism business model; we must embrace the future present. With the empowerments and elevations in the Go Lean roadmap we can succeed in making the Caribbean region a better place to live, work and play, for citizens and tourists alike. 🙂

Download the book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

——-

Appendix A – Thomas Cook

A pioneer of the [leisure] travel agency business, Thomas Cook‘s idea to offer excursions came to him while waiting for the stagecoach on the London Road at Kibworth [England]. With the opening of the extended Midland Counties Railway, he arranged to take a group of 540 temperance campaigners from Leicester Campbell Street station to a rally in Loughborough, eleven miles away. On 5 July 1841, Thomas Cook arranged for the rail company to charge one “shilling” per person that included rail tickets and food for this train journey. Cook was paid a share of the fares actually charged to the passengers, as the railway tickets, being legal contracts between company and passenger, could not have been issued at his own price. This was the first privately chartered excursion train to be advertised to the general public; Cook himself acknowledging that there had been previous, unadvertised, private excursion trains.[34] During the following three summers he planned and conducted outings for temperance societies and Sunday-school children. In 1844 the Midland Counties Railway Company agreed to make a permanent arrangement with him provided he found the passengers. This success led him to start his own business running rail excursions for pleasure, taking a percentage of the railway tickets.

Four years later, he planned his first excursion abroad, when he took a group from Leicester to Calais [Northern France] to coincide with the Paris Exhibition in 1848. The following year he started his ‘grand circular tours’ of Europe. During the 1860s he took parties to Switzerland, Italy, Egypt and the United States. Cook established ‘inclusive independent travel’, whereby the traveller went independently but his agency charged for travel, food and accommodation for a fixed period over any chosen route. Such was his success that the Scottish railway companies withdrew their support between 1862 and 1863 to try the excursion business for themselves.

Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tourism#Emergence_of_leisure_travel

Book Thomas Cook Travel and Leisure Services directly at: https://www.thomascook.com/

——-

Appendix B – Priceline Group – A Giant in Electronic Travel Commerce

The Priceline Group [NASDAQ: PCLN], is a provider of online travel & related services to consumers and local partners in over 200 countries through six primary brands:

Booking.com – Hotel booking source, originating in Europe but now boasting 700,000 properties and 900,000 room nights/year.

Priceline.com – Online travel agency for Air, Hotel and Car Rentals products; originating in North America

Agoda.com – An Asian-based online hotel retailer.[5]

KAYAK – Meta travel search company; originating in North America

Rentalcars.com – A multinational rental car service

OpenTable – Online restaurant-reservation service for about 31,000 global restaurants, sitting 15 million diners a month.[2]

Collectively The Priceline Group operates in over 200 countries and territories in Europe, North America, South America, the Asia-Pacific region, the Middle East and Africa in over 40 languages.

Formerly known as Priceline.com LLC, the company was officially renamed in April 2014 to better to reflect its evolution as a company with multiple independently-operated brands.[1] In 2014, Darren Huston was named Chief Executive Officer of The Priceline Group, a role previously held by Jeff Boyd.[2]

——-

Appendix C – VIDEO – Booking.com TV Commercial – https://youtu.be/VG6Lt7_8uEw

Published on Jan 15, 2014 – What’s your hotel niche? Footwear? Eggs? Electric wind? If you’re into it, Booking.com knows where to “booking” find it. / “Planet Earth’s #1 Accommodation Site”.

 

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8th Violent Crime Warning to Bahamas Tourists

Posted on May 17, 2015 in Economics, Government

Go Lean Commentary

An 8-ounce glass with 4 ounces of water is …

… half full.
… half empty.

It all depends on the perspective.

For an ambulance-chasing lawyer, that perspective needs to be “half empty”.

The foregoing article, a blog submission by Miami-based Maritime Lawyer Jim Walker – see Appendix – is not chasing ambulances, but rather cruise ships. So any assessment from him should be taken with a “grain of salt”. He has an agenda! He attempts to drum up business from cruise ship passengers that may have been hurt or abused in their experience venturing into the cruise industry – on the ship and/or on shore in the port cities.

Yet, in the middle of his “cry wolf” scenarios, there might just be some truth in his advocacy against the cruise lines.

For the stewards of new Caribbean economic eco-systems, we need to pay more than the usual attention to this “town crier”. His claims in this article here, must be fully vetted:

Title: 8th Violent Crime Warning for the Bahamas in 16 Months
By: Jim Walker
Cruise Law News Blog-Site – Posted May 15, 2015; Retrieved from: http://www.cruiselawnews.com/2015/05/articles/crime/8th-violent-crime-warning-for-the-bahamas-in-16-months/

CU Blog - 8th Violent Crime Warning to Bahamas Tourists - Photo 1The U.K.’s  Foreign and Commonwealth Office has issued “foreign travel advice” for travelers to the Bahamas. The U.K. crime warning says:

“There have been incidents of violent crime including robbery, which is often armed and sometimes fatal, in residential and tourist areas of New Providence, Grand Bahama and Freeport. The number of break-ins and robbery incidents reported to the High Commission has increased. There are police patrols in the main tourist areas.

Be vigilant at all times and don’t walk alone away from the main hotels, tourist areas, beaches and downtown Nassau, particularly after dark. Take care if travelling on local bus services after dusk on routes away from the main tourist areas. Do not carry large amounts of cash or jewellery. Robbers may be armed.”

I first learned of the crime warning from Travel Weekly.

Incredibly, this is the eighth crime warning for the Bahamas in the last 16 months.

In 2014, Bahamas was the subject of four critical crime warnings to U.S. citizens (one from the U.S. State Department and three from the U.S. Embassy) and one warning from Canada. There have been 2 prior crime warnings from the U.S. for the Bahamas this year. With this latest U.K. warning, that’s a total of 8 warnings.

I have never heard any country being the recipient of 8 crime warnings in such a short time period. The U.S. warnings are much more specific, mentioning that U.S. tourists have been raped and robbed at gunpoint.

We last wrote about the sorry state of affairs in the Bahamas earlier this month. We received a number of interesting comments to the article which you can read here. Many people avoid a cruise itinerary which includes the Bahamas, or they stay on the cruise ship when it reaches Nassau.

I picked Nassau as the most dangerous cruise destination in the world last year.

Have a thought? Please leave a comment below or join the discussion on our Facebook page.

According to the foregoing article, one Caribbean member-state, the Bahamas, needs to mitigate and remediate its crime activity.

From the publishers of the book Go Lean…Caribbean, our immediate response to Esquire Walker: Message received; warning heeded.

The Go Lean book and movement serves as a roadmap for the introduction of the technocratic Caribbean Union Trade Federation (CU). With the word ‘Trade‘ in the CU‘s branding, obviously the CU is set to optimize Caribbean society through economic empowerment; but the truth of the matter is that the security dynamics of the region are inextricably linked to this economic endeavor. Therefore the Go Lean roadmap has 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 protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improve Caribbean governance to support these engines.

The Go Lean roadmap posits that the Caribbean region must prepare its own security apparatus for its own security needs. So the request is that all Caribbean member-states form and empower a security force to execute a limited scope on their sovereign territories.  The goal is to confederate under a unified entity made up of the Caribbean to provide homeland security to the Caribbean. Homeland Security for the Caribbean has a different meaning than for our American counterparts. Though we must be on defense against military intrusions like terrorism & piracy, we mostly have to contend with threats that may imperil the region’s economic engines, and crime remediation and mitigation. Yes, The CU security goal is for public safety!

So in particular cruise passengers will benefit from new layers of security measures (Page 193) that are both up-front and also behind-the scenes. These will be administered by CU security agencies, and not limited to the authority of the member-states.

The book contends that bad actors will emerge just as a result of economic successes in the region. This point is pronounced early in the book with the Declaration of Interdependence (Page 12) that claims:

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.

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, including piracy and other forms of terrorism, 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.

The Caribbean appointing “new guards”, or a security pact to ensure public safety is comprehensive endeavor, encapsulating the needs of all Caribbean stakeholders: residents and visitors alike.

We would like to direct Esquire Walker to a new line of work; or perhaps just a new target for his legal practice.

The Go Lean roadmap calls for a permanent professional force with naval forces, plus an Intelligence agency. The CU Trade Federation will lead, fund and facilitate the security force, encapsulating all the existing armed forces in the region plus exercising some regional oversight over law enforcement. This CU Homeland Security Force would get its legal authorization from a legal Status of Forces Agreement plus an Interstate Compact for US Territories signed at the CU treaty initiation; this means “Step One, Day One” in the Go Lean roadmap.

Covering all the complaints in the foregoing article about government corruption, the Go Lean roadmap “polices the Police” to ensure the optimization of justice institutions.

We are heeding your warnings Esquire Walker!

The Go Lean book details a series of community ethos, strategies, tactics, implementations and advocacies to provide increased public safety & security in the Caribbean region:

Economic Principle – Consequences of Choices Lie in Future Page 21
Community Ethos – Privacy –vs- Public Protection Page 23
Community Ethos – Intelligence Gathering Page 23
Community Ethos – “Crap” Happens Page 23
Community Ethos – Minority Equalization Page 24
Community Ethos – Cooperatives Page 25
Community Ethos – Ways to Manage Reconciliations Page 34
Community Ethos – Ways to Improve Sharing Page 35
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Greater Good Page 37
Tactical – Confederating a non-sovereign union Page 63
Tactical – Fostering a Technocracy Page 64
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Central Bank – Cruise e-Payment Cards Page 73
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Homeland Security Page 75
Implementation – Ways to Pay for Change Page 101
Implementation – Start-up Foreign Policy Initiatives Page 102
Implementation – Start-up Security Initiatives Page 103
Planning – Big Ideas – Regional Single Market Page 127
Planning – Ways to Make the Caribbean Better Page 131
Planning – Ways to Improve Failed-State Indices Page 134
Planning – Lessons Learned from the West Indies Federation Page 135
Planning – Lessons from New York – Port Authority Police Page 139
Planning – Lessons from the American West – Law & Order
 Page 142
Planning – Lessons from Egypt – Keep Tourism Functional Page 143
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Governance Page 168
Advocacy – Ways to Better Manage the Social Contract Page 170
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Leadership Page 171
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Justice Page 177
Advocacy – Ways to Reduce Crime Page 178
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Homeland Security Page 180
Advocacy – Ways to Mitigate Terrorism Page 181
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Intelligence Gathering/Analysis Page 182
Advocacy – Ways to Improve for Natural Disasters Page 184
Advocacy – Ways to Enhance Tourism – Example: Natalee Holloway Page 190
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Event Tourism Page 191
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Cruise Tourism Page 193
Advocacy – Ways to Protect Human Rights Page 220
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Urban Living Page 234

Our region must do better to serve-and-protect visitors to our shores; tourism is still reeling from the failure to prosecute the crime against Spring Break Tourist Natalee Holloway in Aruba in 2005. – See Appendix VIDEO below.

Other subjects related to security and governing empowerments for the region have been blogged in other Go Lean commentary, as sampled here:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5304 Mitigating the Eventual Abuse of Power
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=5210 Cruise Ship Commerce – Getting Ready for Change
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4639 Tobago: A Model for Cruise Tourism and a Plan to Optimize the Industry
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4425 Cruise Payment Model: Electronic Cards and Smart Phones
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=4360 Dreading the American: ‘Caribbean Basin Security Initiative’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3889 Cruise Payment Model: RBC EZPay – Ready for Change
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=2782 Intelligence Model: Red Light Traffic Cameras Could Impact Millions
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1487 Intelligence Model: Here come the Drones … and the Concerns
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=960 Intelligence Model: NSA records all phone calls in Bahamas – Model
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=599 Ailing Puerto Rico open to radical economic fixes
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=546 Bad Model: Book Review – ‘The   Divide’ – … Injustice in the Age of the Wealth Gap
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=535 Event Security: Remembering and learning from Boston
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=392 Jamaica to receive World Bank funds to help in crime fight
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=273 10 Things We Don’t Want from the US: # 6 Organized Crime

Underlying to the prime directive of elevating the economics, security and governing engines of the Caribbean, is the desire to make the Caribbean homeland, a better place to live, work and play for visitors and residents alike. We know “bad actors” will emerge – they always do! But we do not need these “bad actors” disrupting the peace of all Caribbean residents (42 million people), or the 10 million Diaspora as they frequent their tropical homeland or especially not the 80 million tourists that visit the region annually (including the 10 million cruise passengers).

The Go Lean roadmap was composed with the community ethos of the Greater Good foremost. The related quotation applies: “the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few” (Page 37). All of the Caribbean are hereby urged to lean-in to this roadmap.

🙂

Download the book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

=========

Appendix: About the Author: Jim Walker

CU Blog - 8th Violent Crime Warning to Bahamas Tourists - Photo 2“Everything the cruise lines don’t want you to know” is the motto of this award winning maritime law blog authored by Miami lawyer Jim Walker.

The New York Times describes Jim as “a maritime lawyer in Miami who has attended more than half a dozen Congressional hearings about cruise ship crime and passenger safety.” Jim has been involved in maritime litigation since 1983.  Based in Miami, Florida, Jim represents passengers and crew members injured or assaulted on cruise ships around the world.

==========

Appendix: Jim Walker Blog Site Visitor Commentaries:

Selected Comments:

Mary – May 16, 2015 4:39 PM

I love the Bahamas! Sadly to say my family rented a house Dec 2014 into the New year and were robbed New Years Eve. Thankfully we were out at Junkanoo. I was very upset and frightened but will always go back to Nassau.

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Srgt. Thomas – May 16, 2015 6:13 PM

This morning 5/16/15, a fashion designer was murdered in his home and his house set on fire. And also four gang members battled it out in the streets with the police killing one gang member, injuring two, and one still out on the loose. Tourist, expats, workers, investors should leave ASAP, this country is on the verge of a civil uprising according to U.S. intelligence. Our government wants to thank you so much Mr. Jim Walker, you are helping us get the word out. You are a true American, and hope the rest of your Nation realizes this too.

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Michelle Farrington – May 16, 2015 6:58 PM

You never cease to amaze me. While you think nothing of writing about my beautiful country.

Ok so you say we have been cited 8 times for most dangerous. Well, the last time I checked the United States the land of the so called free… yet Americans have no privacy and the IRS continues to rob the hard working class of people.

Oh and what do you, Jim Walker have to say about the police continually killing black people, calling it self defense? oh and what about all these shootings in killings in schools and universities.

Let me remind you that when a country rapes and steals another countries resources in the name of bringing PEACE BY MEANS OF WARS, there are repercussions. How many families have been destroyed or ripped a part because the U.S.A. doesn’t care how many men/soldiers lives are sacrificed. These persons are someone’s father, husband, wife, son or daughter.

While there are murders and violence in Nassau, we don’t live in fear and don’t go out at night.. if this paranoia exist, then they are a small minority. These types of crimes are basically revenge, or domestic related. So you say, the USA does not have these types of crime? Really????? I don’t think so!

You need to get a life and leave us alone!

Go write on all the crime throughout your country!

I have been rushed, knocked to the ground and robbed in the parking lot of a hotel..yes, in the U.S. of A.
To this day Car Rentals are targeted and many Bahamians have been victim to this type of crime in your country.

So what say you?

Michelle D. Farrington

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Willa Kingsley – May 16, 2015 7:11 PM

My family and I are that the Atlantis hotel right now, I’m writing this comment with my IPhone as I speak. This morning at around 3-4 I believe we were awaken to gun fire in the distance, it sounded like a war. We just found out from the hotel’s lobby desk police had a confrontation with a group of gang members in the street. It’s still unclear if anyone was killed, but you should have heard the sounds, WOW! We are seriously thinking of leaving earlier than we hoped for, my kids are scared to death in leaving our room; this is nuts!

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Jim Walker – May 16, 2015 9:09 PM

Michelle:

Thanks for your comments.

You make several good points.

Our U.S. Federal government over-reaches all of the time. The IRS, Homeland Security & FBI regularly violate the rights of U.S. citizens.

Our police (white and black) execute black men in the streets. It angers me greatly. It is a national disgrace. Travon Martin, Michael Brown and Freddy Grey are the martyrs of our going civil rights movement.

You’re wrong about the men and women in our military. They don’t “rape and steal” as you claim. The Bahamas would be under the thumb of the Nazi’s but for the U.S. military. We have protected the world for decades. I see you could care less aboout that and are filled with hate. But the Bahamas couldn’t protect itself much less other countries if a troop of girl scouts attacked.

The fact remains that Nassau is out-of-control dangerous. Your crime is widespread and increasing. Your government is corrupt. Your legal system is a joke. Your police are ineffective and corrupt. The Bahamas is dependant on tourism, primarily from the U.S., but you can’t stop from selling drugs to the cruise passengers or preying on them.

My blog is read by mostly cruise passengers and crew members. It is intended to warn them of the danger on cruises ships and ports of call that they may not be aware of. Over a million people read over 6 millions pages a year.

Most U.S. citizens think stepping off a cruise ship from Miami to the Bahamas is safe. It’s not. We report issues about the Bahamas which you and other delusioanal Bahamains try and keep secret. We have sent the messahge wide and far.

If you want to warn people about dangers in the U.S., by all means do so. We wish you the same success in warning travelers that we have achieved.

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Finely Tuned And Polished – May 16, 2015 9:41 PM

The reason quite simple: The Bahamians are deathly afraid of the Government, so they take out their frustrations of feeling like they are on a tight leash with the tourist.I have many Bahamian friends who are quite friendly and hard working Bahamians and church goers. Its a small group who honestly believe by staying together, between the drug lords and cons they will become rich in a short period of time. 50% go fishing.. and never return!!! Wake up !!!

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Appendix VIDEO: – Natalee Holloway Witness Comes Forward: ‘I Knew She Was Dead’ – http://bcove.me/ky8bglp1

Dave Holloway – the father of Natalee Holloway – is back in Aruba exclusively with INSIDE EDITION searching for answers in the disappearance of his 18-year-old daughter, Natalee. The main suspect in Natalee’s disappearance is the notorious Joran van der Sloot – now serving a life sentence for a different murder in Peru. They first met at the Holiday Inn Casino where he gambled regularly and she was staying with her high school classmates on their senior trip. A decade later the trail has gone cold, perhaps until now. A new witness emerges, Jurrien de Jong, a citizen of the Netherlands who lives in Amsterdam, says he was one of the last people to see Natalee alive. He claims to have seen the suspect, Joran, chasing Natalee, and later stash her body in the crawl space on a construction site.

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The State of Aruba’s Economy

Posted on February 19, 2015 in Economics, Locations

Go Lean Commentary

The Caribbean is comprised of 4 different language groups. We hear mostly of the English, French and Spanish speaking islands, but the Dutch speaking islands are far from inconsequential. They are integral to the Caribbean landscape and integral to the plan for regional confederation, consolidation and elevation.

The book Go Lean…Caribbean addresses the needs of all the Caribbean, including the Dutch territories. In the book, the islands are referred to as the formal name of the Netherlands Antilles (Page 16). This consists of two island groups; the ABC Islands of Aruba, Bonaire and Curaçao, located just off the Venezuelan coast. Plus also the SSS islands of Sint Maarten, Saba and Sint Eustatius, located in the Leeward Islands southeast of the Virgin Islands near the northern end of the Lesser Antilles. The Dutch colonized these islands in the 17th century, (at one point, Anguilla, Tobago, the British Virgin Islands, and St. Croix of the US Virgin Islands had also been Dutch), and united them in the new constituent state of the Netherlands Antilles in December 1954.

s Economy - Photo 2The largest of the Dutch Caribbean is Aruba.

Aruba called for secession from the Netherlands Antilles from as early as the 1930s, becoming a separate state within the Kingdom of the Netherlands in 1986. After many other organizational developments, by 2010, Aruba is dispositioned as one of the four constituent countries that form the Kingdom of the Netherlands, along with the Netherlands (European homeland), Curaçao and Sint Maarten.

What is the status of Aruba today?

How has it fared as an autonomous state?

The Go Lean book posits that Aruba is in crisis; (along with the rest of the Caribbean). This is also the assessment by the International Monetary Fund, as related in this news article:

By: By the Caribbean Journal staff
Aruba’s economy is “recovering gradually” from a “severe double-dip recession,” according to the International Monetary Fund, which recently concluded its 2015 Article IV Mission to the Dutch Caribbean island.

The recession was [exacerbated] by a pair of factors: the global financial crisis and the shutdown of the oil refinery in Aruba.

“These shocks have substantially increased public debt—over 80 percent of GDP in 2014—and eroded fiscal space,” the IMF said in a statement. “To address these fiscal challenges, the authorities have undertaken major entitlement reforms and are aiming to reach a small fiscal surplus in 2018.”

Without similar measures, however, the IMF warned that the pace of fiscal consolidation in the island could slow and public debt would continue to rise in the medium term.

s Economy - Photo 1Growth in Aruba is projected to rise by about 2.5 percent in 2015, which would put the island in favorable territory with the rest of the region, though.

The closure of the refinery, however, puts even more pressure on the island’s tourism sector, the IMF said.

That could compound the island’s risk, though, given its large dependence on tourists from the US and from Venezuela, with the latter’s economic crisis adding to the risk.

But the IMF said that Aruba had maintained its competitiveness in tourism, with its share of the Caribbean’s tourism market share continuing to grow.

“In addition, the authorities’ marketing efforts, access to new US hubs, and additional airlift capacity from South America have improved resilience,” the IMF said. “Increasing labor market flexibility and reducing the costs of doing business would not only further improve Aruba’s competitiveness, but would also help its adjustment to external shocks and facilitate diversification.”
Caribbean Journal Regional News Site – Posted February 16, 2015 –
http://www.caribjournal.com/2015/02/16/the-state-of-arubas-economy/

The Caribbean country of Aruba needs to focus on growing its economy and creating jobs. The Go Lean book asserts that this effort is too big a task for just one Caribbean member-state alone, that Aruba needs to convene, confederate and collaborate with the other regional member-states. As such, the Go Lean book 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 protect the resultant economic engines.
  • Improvement of Caribbean governance to support these engines.

The Go Lean book (Page 3) makes this simple assertion regarding the state of Aruba and all the Caribbean economy: the region is in crisis. There is something wrong in these island and coastal states, that  despite the greatest address in the world, instead of the world “beating a path” to these doors, the people of the Caribbean have “beat down their doors” to get out. Aruba fails to keep its young people at home. In fact, the anecdotal experience (one story after another) is that young people abandon this island as soon as they finish high school; many never to return again, except for occasional visits. (Aruban natives – plus all Netherland Antilles states – have Dutch citizenship, sharing the same Dutch passport as the Kingdom of the Netherlands).

A mission of the Go Lean roadmap is to minimize the “push-and-pull” factors that contribute to this alarmingly high rate of societal abandonment – one report reflects a 70% brain drain rate for the overall Caribbean. The book stresses (early at Page 13 & 14) the need to be on-guard for these “push-and-pull” factors in these pronouncements in the Declaration of Interdependence:

xix.      Whereas our legacy in recent times is one of societal abandonment, it is imperative that incentives and encouragement be put in place to first dissuade the human flight, and then entice and welcome the return of our Diaspora back to our shores. This repatriation should be effected with the appropriate guards so as not to imperil the lives and securities of the repatriated citizens or the communities they inhabit. The right of repatriation is to be extended to any natural born citizens despite any previous naturalization to foreign sovereignties.

xxi.      Whereas the preparation of our labor force can foster opportunities and dictate economic progress for current and future generations, the Federation must ensure that educational and job training opportunities are fully optimized for all residents of all member-states, with no partiality towards any gender or ethnic group. The Federation must recognize and facilitate excellence in many different fields of endeavor, including sciences, languages, arts, music and sports. This responsibility should be executed without incurring the risks of further human flight, as has been the past history.

xxv.      Whereas the legacy of international democracies had been imperiled due to a global financial crisis, the structure of the Federation must allow for financial stability and assurance of the Federation’s institutions. To mandate the economic vibrancy of the region, monetary and fiscal controls and policies must be incorporated as proactive and reactive measures. These measures must address threats against the financial integrity of the Federation and of the member-states.

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… – impacting the region with more jobs.

This commentary previously related details of the “push-and-pull” factors for Caribbean emigration to North America and Europe, and the region’s own job-creation efforts. Here is a sample of earlier blogs:

https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3834 State of the Caribbean Union
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3780 National Sacrifice: The Missing Ingredient – Caribbean people not willing to die or live in sacrifice to their homeland
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3446 Forecast for higher unemployment in Caribbean in 2015
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=3050 Obama’s immigration tweaks leave Big Tech wanting more
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1698 American “Pull” Factors – STEM Jobs Are Filling Slowly
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1683 British public sector workers strike over ‘poverty pay’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1596 Book Review: ‘Prosper Where You Are Planted’
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1433 Caribbean loses more than 70 percent of tertiary educated to brain drain
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1296 Remittances to Caribbean Increased By 3 Percent in 2013
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=1256 Traditional 4-year College Degree are Terrible Investments for the Caribbean Region
https://goleancaribbean.com/blog/?p=841 Having Less Babies (Population) is Bad for the Economy

The Go Lean book and these accompanying blogs posit that the economic failures in the Caribbean in general and Aruba in particular is the direct result of the lack of diversity in industrial development. The region depends too heavily on tourism. Aruba though, made some diversification attempts with oil refinery installations; according to Wikipedia:

With its location near Venezuela, the island became an attractive spot for oil refineries. The Lago Oil and Transport Company, owned by Standard Oil of New Jersey (now Exxon), opened in 1929 near the transshipping port of San Nicolaas. Following in their footsteps, the Eagle Oil Refinery opened soon after. Over the next few decades, the oil industry took over as Aruba’s primary economic force.

During World War II, considerable expansion was done to the Lago Refinery, becoming one of the largest refineries in the world – only bested by Royal Dutch Shell Isla refinery on nearby Curaçao – and a major producer of petroleum products for the Allied war efforts.

The Eagle Oil Refinery shut down and was dismantled in the late 1950s. But the Lago refinery kept going until 1985, when the demand for oil fell and Exxon closed it. In 1991, the Coastal Corporation bought it, scaled down operations, and reopened it. Coastal Corporation later sold the refinery to Valero Energy Corporation in 2004. Its reopening didn’t raise Aruba’s oil industry to its previous heights although it did revive that sector and continued to be a key contributor to the country’s economy until 2009 when it was closed.

Aruba is now applying a strategy to “double-down” on tourism; see Appendix-VIDEO below. The Go Lean roadmap asserts that this strategy is flawed; that while prudence dictates that the Caribbean nations expand and optimize their tourism products, the Caribbean must 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 like Aruba. Rather, shifting the responsibility to a region-wide, professionally-managed, deputized technocracy will result in greater production and greater accountability. The roadmap will facilitate economic growth and job creation.

This is the charge of the Go Lean…Caribbean roadmap, to do the heavy-lifting, to implement the organization dynamics to impact Caribbean society here and now with economic growth and jobs. The following are the community ethos, strategies, tactics and operational advocacies to effectuate this goal:

Community Ethos – People Respond to Incentives Page 21
Community Ethos – Economic Systems Influences Choices & Incentives Page 21
Community Ethos – The Consequences of Choice Lie in the Future Page 21
Community Ethos – Job Multiplier Page 22
Community Ethos – Minority Equalization Page 24
Community Ethos – Lean Operations Page 24
Community Ethos – Ways to Impact the Greater Good Page 37
Strategy – Vision – Make the Caribbean the Best Address   on Planet Page 45
Strategy – Mission – Repatriate Diaspora Page 46
Strategy – Mission – Dissuade Human Flight/“Brain Drain” Page 46
Tactical – Separation of Powers – Union versus Member-States Page 71
Implementation – Assemble CariCom, Dutch, French, Cuba and US   Territories Page 95
Implementation – Enact Territorial Compacts for PR & the Virgin Islands Page 96
Implementation – Foreign Policy Initiatives at Start-up Page 102
Implementation – Ways to Deliver Page 109
Implementation – Ways to Better Manage Debt Page 114
Implementation – Reasons to Repatriate Page 118
Implementation – Ways to Benefit from Globalization Page 119
Implementation – Ways to Promote Independence Page 120
Planning – 10 Big Ideas for the Caribbean Page 127
Planning – Ways to Make the Caribbean Better Page 131
Advocacy – Ways to Grow the Economy Page 151
Advocacy – Ways to Create Jobs Page 152
Advocacy – Ways to Improve Governance Page 168
Advocacy – Ways to Enhance Tourism Page 190
Advocacy – Ways to Market Southern California – New Markets Page 194
Advocacy – Ways to Impact Extractions Page 195
Advocacy – Ways to Impact the Diaspora Page 217
Advocacy – Ways to Impact DutchTerritories Page 246

This Go Lean book accepts that the current State of Aruba’s Economy does not have to be a permanent disposition. The roadmap presents a plan for greater energy independence, energy security and energy generation in the region – there will be the need to capitalize on Aruba’s core-competence with oil refineries. So under the Go Lean roadmap, Aruba’s economy will do better; the same as all of the Caribbean will do better. This roadmap is a 5-year plan to effect change, to make our homeland a better place to live, work and play.

As for the Dutch Caribbean territories, even though they are no longer considered colonies, but rather constituent countries of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, they are effectively just welfare states dependent on Amsterdam; and a feeder for low-cost labor in Holland. They are inconsequential within the Dutch sphere of influence. There are parasites not protégés!

We must do better!

Now is the time for Aruba, the Dutch Caribbean and all of the Caribbean, the people and institutions, to lean-in to this Go Lean … Caribbean roadmap. 🙂

Download the book Go Lean … Caribbean – now!

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Appendix – VIDEO: Aruba – One Happy Island – http://youtu.be/p7NdI0jmvXA

Published on Mar 28, 2012 – Our white-sand beaches, cooling trade winds and warm, friendly people are just a few reasons why so many people return to Aruba year after year. Discover everything that makes this One Happy Island…

 

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