Our brave forefathers sowed the seed
From which our pride is sprung,
A pride that makes no wanton boast
Of what it has withstood
That binds our hearts from coast to coast –
The pride of nationhood.Snippet from: National Anthem Of Barbados
Barbadians will celebrate National Heroes tomorrow. We understand what the former government intended by holding up the ten individuals for Barbadians to know of their contributions and hopefully appreciate and emulate for generations to come. We may question some of the people selected to be heroes or more accurately those not selected. All in all we do understand the concept of identifying successful people from the past to inspire those in the present and BU fully support it. Barbados has been able to chart its path in the world with good result over the years. By every measure possible most agree that in the post-independence era we have planned and managed our resources in a way which has forced admiration by many around the globe.
We looked at the pictures of our National Heroes and wondered what we should write about on the eve of such an important anniversary. The images of Grantley Adams and Errol Barrow who are given much credit for laying the foundation to the success which Barbados has enjoyed post-independence triggered a pensive disposition in the BU household, it dawned on us that they would not want us to use National Heroes Day to dwell only on the past.
A key ingredient to the success formula used by Barbados over the last 40 years has been the importance of education to enfranchise our people. We feel sure that those National Heroes who are all dead with the exception of Sir Garry Sobers would want Barbadians to leverage the advantage of being a highly educated society to search for solutions to the current economic crisis.
Despite the fact that a sister blogger at Living In Barbados criticized the locally trained economists for being silent at such a critical juncture in our history, we are optimistic that with the change in government we may see a change in their behaviour. Some of us know that the former Prime Minister Owen Arthur was not easy! There are some exceptions and we commend Dr. Justin Robinson who has contributed to our robust debate at times with his insightful interventions. Unfortunately our effort to encourage others, especially Dr. Michael Howard has been unsuccessful to date.
It is against this background that we are happy to share a ‘paper’ written by Dr. George Reid, a Barbadian who is an economist by training and a former Director of Finance. Some of you may be aware that this is a Barbadian who was a civil servant back in the 70’s through to the 90’s and would have participated in policy planning and execution at the highest level in government. We are impressed with Dr. Reid’s humanist inclination in his paper as he explore economic concepts to explain why the Barbados economy is under threat, and more importantly what is needed to retrieve the situation. We thank this educated Barbadian who is better positioned than most to share his experience gained having worked closely with the Democratic Labour Party during the ‘oil crisis’ of the 70’s. We must warn you that the paper is 14 pages long but makes for interesting reading. For those of you who want to be educated about how economics can be used to mobilize resources in Barbados for the good of all, here is the link:
We wish to thank the BU family member who graciously supplied us with the draft document which was researched by Dr. Reid. We hope the blogosphere will use the document to inform the current debate as we search for a path to progress.
The blogmaster invites you to join the discussion.