Submitted by Looking Glass
Development in any language means change. National development of which economic development/industrialisation is but a component requires a significant break with the past. It requires structural change and an intellectual leap into the future. Resistance to such change is a structural impediment created by the socio-economic system. The educational system in its current manifestation is a very costly repressive factor in the development process.
National development of which economic development is part implies the power to create wealth. It is dependent on our ability to generate ideas and turn them into reality.
Development is qualitative; growth like the GNP refers to the increase in size and is quantitative. GNP refers to the total value of goods and services produced. It includes consumption, investment, government spending and the excess of imports over exports. Changes in GNP do not necessarily reflect positive changes in the economic or social structure of the country. Economic prosperity involves qualitative factors. In today’s world the foundation of growth is human skill. One of the most important factors in development is education, the kind that provides a broad general knowledge, facilitates managerial competence and innovation. The latter will be manifested in new product creation and production.
My proposal for educational reform is based on human rather than a material approach to development. As I see it economic development depends on our ability to create, innovate, organize and manage our affairs. Maintaining the educational system and or recourse to cosmetic solutions means forfeiting the right to create wealth and development. Moreover it means delivering present and future generations to the tyranny of ongoing bondage. At stake here is qualitative not quantitative education and its accessibility. Give a man a fish and you will feed him for a day. Teach him to fish and he will feed himself.
Replacing secondary schools and common entrance exams with Junior Colleges to be entered at age 14 and continuous assessment solves nothing. All kids are not “academically” inclined. Restructuring the system does not mean creating new schools or giving the old ones new names. We already have enough primary, secondary and community schools and UWI. What is needed is a change in subjects taught such as those related to farming/agriculture, business, basic technology etc which can and should be introduced at pre-university level and fundamental research. Information is crucial for innovation. Teach kids not only to fish but to fashion the tools necessary and to identify waters for successful fishing. The cost is meagre and it would significantly reduce the diminishing returns to education. The creation of an “educated underclass” is very costly and distinctly regressive.
We are a commercial/service tourism dependent economy without natural resources and limited ability for upgrading and increasing productivity and employment. All we have is a bit of land sun and sea. We cannot control tourism and it is becoming noncompetitive. Stop selling the land and use it to grow vegetables, food and items like coffee, tea and or cocoa which can also be sold in the region. It would reduce the import bill, living cost, generate employment and improve health. It will not enable everyone to have big homes, cars and to live the grand lifestyle. It will enable people to live within their means, government to pay down debt and provide more and or better social services. No country has full employment. There is poverty and low wage workers everywhere. We have not the where-with-all to be different. Champagne taste with mauby coppers does more harm than good
Selling the land for hotels and homes for foreigners to buy in an import dependent country is neither dynamic nor nationally profitable. It enhances reliance on imports the cost of which will continue to rise and increase basic living costs. Mahogany furniture is unique and second to none. Some years ago two US firms wanted to import the furniture, one wanted office furniture. We did nothing about it. Instead the mahogany and other trees have been replaced by hotels and houses for sale to foreigners. And so we expose the island to the vagary of climate in the name of development. Right now over 2000 homes are advertised for sale on three websites (not the local press) primarily for foreign whites. Ponder the implications of an increased foreign and local population.
We blame everyone and everything for our problems except ourselves. It is wrong to even suggest that many of our problems are rooted in slavery and colonialism especially education. They never taught you to think or behave as you do. The pre 1960 system served us very well. Barbados was known as the “Sceptred Isle” in part because our education system was the envy of the world. Some Rear Admirals of the Fleet and two Signatories to the US Declaration of Independence were educated here. The current system needs to be reformed. The private sector may have the finance needed to start new production enterprises but it requires people with skills and willingness to soil their hands in the ground. Donnelly and Intel came and left because of the skills shortage. And stop blaming the current global recession. As noted in earlier articles we were in “recession” before the global one.
The socio-economic reorganization of Bim over the last 25 years enlarged the divide between consumption and production, the have and have-nots and placed us far behind the 8–ball. Having set our chairs on the Titanic of or own making we linger in the shadows of socio-economic death. The next economic boom cycle will be technological rather than labour intensive. Economic power will shift from West to East. Recipient benefactors will be Brazil and African countries with natural resources and people willing to work the land. It is unlikely to generate foreign investment, significant additions to employment or GNP for us. We have no powerful additions to fuel development: no non-cyclical job generating industries to enable us to compete or even catch up, in sky-high debt and a bundle of social deficits.
We delude ourselves to think that our personal and foreign debt can be retired and economic growth and development generated without substantial social and economic change. Our total net worth is insufficient to cover government spending and new investment. Recession aided by population increase will be worst in the next decade.
Teach people to utilize what we have-land, sea and sun-and to live within their means. It will not solve the problem in the short term but will reduce “recession” and facilitate long term recovery. Government can only provide the tools people must do the work
The blogmaster invites you to join the discussion.