The economic bread pudding

I remember the first time it happened. I was probably 11 or 12. I picked up the bag and as I was about to throw it in the garbage, my mother screamed: "Don't you dare throw that away! I'm making bread pudding!" Bread what? She couldn't really be using the mouldy, green bread to make the same bread pudding that I loved. Maybe she was making it for the dog. Maybe she was going crazy. Or maybe times were just hard. In any event, there was no way on earth I would eat the end product of that filthy bread. But, of course, I didn't just eat the bread pudding, I devoured it. Who knew something so delicious could derive from something so stale.

Politicians across Jamaica are probably reading this and thinking, "Stupid youngster! We've long known that formula!" They have. A similarly fetid recipe has secured power for countless elected representatives - promise Jamaicans better access to water, better roads and better jobs - water, roads, jobs; repeat.

When it comes to the economic pudding, our representatives have tried to mimic their election recipe. Stale promises and ideas might make for good election strategy but, unlike my mother's bread, they don't make good pudding.

Same Old Ingredients

For decades, we've been baking our economic pudding using the same, old ingredients - a cup of white sand, a handful of remittances, a touch of bauxite, a pinch of manufacturing and a dash of agriculture. The result: a flat pudding that has barely grown over the last 30 years and has, in fact, shrunk over the past three. While the region expects annual economic growth of 4.5 per cent over the next five years, Jamaica's growth is estimated to be a paltry 1.3 per cent - the seventh-slowest rate on earth.

To make matters worse, our debt-to-GDP ratio is roughly 130 per cent. In other words, our creditors' plates are collectively larger than the pudding we make each year. For every 10 slices of pudding our Government maintains to feed the country, five must go to creditors. At this rate, we'll soon have to take our economic puddings from the oven and hand them directly to the creditors. Jamaicans will labour to bake the pudding without tasting a single slice.

The recipe needs to be overhauled. The global recession has taught us the dangers of maintaining the status quo. Our tourism product is under increasing global competition, remittances have nosedived, and depressed global aluminium demand, ageing infrastructure, and high energy prices have made our bauxite industry woefully uncompetitive. These sectors must be upgraded and our economy modernised and diversified if we are to comfortably satisfy the growing appetite of our people - and our creditors.

New or improved ingredients that should be added to the economic batter include:

Information and communications technology (ICT): Focus on becoming a regional leader in IT outsourcing by increasing the IT labour force through secondary education, certificate programmes, and grants and loan forgiveness for tertiary study in ICT; simultaneously implement tax and import-duty incentives to attract foreign investment in the sector.

Tourism: Create distinct branding and development strategies for the various tourist markets - Ocho Rios could be a low-cost destination; Portland might be marketed for ecotourism; Montego Bay could be a convention, gambling, and medical tourism destination; Negril, true to its heritage, could become the Amsterdam of the region - with coffee shops offering the botanical substance for which its parish is noted.

Energy: Our high petroleum import bill has led to massive haemorrhaging of capital while rendering manufacturing and other sectors globally uncompetitive. Incentives should be provided for widespread development of solar, wind and biofuels. The JPS monopoly should be discontinued in order to promote more effective and economical distribution of electricity.

Structural changes to government: Fair and transparent government is needed to reduce waste and ensure competitiveness. The ferocious public-sector wage bill should be tamed by decidedly cutting our oversize bureaucracy and instilling a leaner, more efficient government.

Sure, our mothers can make miracles with stale bread, but our government can't do the same with stale ideas. If we are to grow our economic pudding, we must throw some innovative ingredients into the mix.

Din Duggan is an attorney who now works as a consultant with a global legal search firm. Email him at columns@gleanerjm.com or dinduggan@gmail.com, or follow him at facebook.com/dinduggan and twitter.com/YoungDuggan.