JUXTAPOSED AGAINST the present anxieties associated with the passage of Hurricane Ivan, news of Jamaica's impressive investment performance in attracting investment flows is more than a breath of fresh air.
The recently published World Investment Report 2004, featured in last Friday's Financial Gleaner, stated that while investment flows to the Latin American and Caribbean region fell by three per cent in the period 2000-2003, Jamaica bucked the trend and recorded inflows of over US$700 million - our highest levels of inflows. This creditable performance put Jamaica ahead of countries such as Trinidad and Tobago, Costa Rica and the Dominican Republic that had outstripped us in the 1990s.
An equally important finding of the Report is that it has confirmed the shift that has taken place in the world and local economy in terms of the dominance of the service sector. The report noted that 60 per cent of foreign direct investment (FDI) is geared towards the services sector. Another notable feature of the Report is that Jamaica placed at number 20 in terms of best business practices.
This high score can be interpreted as confirmation of an earlier USAID report that listed Jamaica in the Top 10 most friendly countries to do business with. Taken together, these results augur well, given Government's announced policies of significant increased investments in the tourism and bauxite-alumina sectors, that should soon come on stream.
Looking in more detail at the shift towards the services sector, it is an open secret that Jamaica can only maintain its competitiveness if the education system can deliver well-trained workers at the required pace.
This is a difficult proposition given the ongoing debate about educational financing and the proportion of the budget that should be allocated to it, in a context of dwindling resources caused by the high debt burden.
Still, against the background of the crime problem, social decay and general country image problem, there is no denying that the creditable investment performance last year must be celebrated. Let us work to maintain and improve our more than impressive performance.
THE OPINIONS ON THIS PAGE, EXCEPT FOR THE ABOVE, DO NOT NECESSARILY REFLECT THE VIEWS OF THE GLEANER.
