THE EDITOR, Sir:
I WOULD like to comment on recent statements concerning tourism in Jamaica. Butch Stewart is not alone in urging Jamaica to invest more heavily in the tourist industry. But with American troops capturing the Iraqi capital, the downturn in foreign tourists willing to leave their shores for Jamaica, and now this recent outbreak of SARS, can Jamaicans not see the fallacy of such an advocacy?
We Jamaicans must face up to very unpleasant truths there is nothing that we can offer the visiting tourist that cannot be offered in other islands in the region. What sets us apart from other tourist attractions is the high level of crime, complaints of tourist harassment, and a large number of Jamaicans willing to leave the island by fair means or foul.
This United States war in Iraq should have no effect on Jamaica's ability to produce her own food, clothing and raw materials to build her infrastructure. What the war has exposed is the folly of relying on barrels of imported goods and remittances to sustain the country. Jamaica is no longer productive, and that is the reason why two-thirds of every Jamaican dollar has to go to debt servicing.
Instead of tourism, Jamaica should make an effort to recover industrial capacities long since lost. She must learn to grow her own food, make her own clothes, and manufacture the materials needed rebuild her infrastructure. To say, as many often do, that we don't have the ability to do these things is only a half-truth. The same global economy that sells us automobiles will sell us the means to make auto parts. The global economy will not withhold from Jamaica a power plant capable of generating cheap, reliable electricity in order to be more productive.
At the time of her independence, Jamaica used to assemble stoves, refrigerators, and furniture, to name a few. Jamaica even used to have automobiles assembled here before being put on the local roads! Over the past 30 years, each government had allowed the productive capacity of the nation to wither away, increasing our dependence on America to send free items to the country.
Jamaica must now ponder how the US will respond to the former's opposition to the latter's very successful war in Iraq. Will America the Government and the people be so forgiving? This is the price of over-reliance on tourism.
I am, etc.,
D. EDWARDS
Tboyland37@aol.com
Brooklyn, New York
Via Go-Jamaica
