Ashford W. Meikle, Staff Reporter
The U.S. Ambassador to Jamaica, Brenda LaGrange Johnson (second left) shares a joke with the executive director of AMCHAM, Becky Stockhausen (left) and president and CEO of Cable and Wireless Jamaica, Rodney Davis after Mr. Davis presented AMCHAM with a cheque of $5 million to assist in the establishment of the Grants Pen Police Station and Health Centre. At right is the first female president of AMCHAM, Audrey Marks. The occasion was AMCHAM's 'Speaker's Forum Luncheon' held yesterday at the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel in New Kingston. - RUDOLPH BROWN/CHIEF PHOTOGRAPHER
UNITED STATES Ambassador to Jamaica, Brenda LaGrange says crime is the biggest obstacle to Jamaica's economic growth.
LaGrange Johnson, who was giving the main address at the American Chamber of Commerce of Jamaica's (AMCHAM) Speaker's Forum Luncheon at the Jamaica Pegasus Hotel, New Kingston, yesterday said AMCHAM had developed and identified the single largest impediment to development and economic growth in Jamaica.
"It is neither high interest rates nor low productivity. It is crime," she said. "Guns and drugs are the two biggest problems for law enforcement."
The U.S. Ambassador reiterated Washington's "commitment to fight against these soulless [criminal] interests."
She noted, however, that crime in Jamaica should not be viewed in isolation from international events.
AN INTERNATIONAL PROBLEM
"Crime is an international problem. We are up against an enemy without conscience," she said. "Multi-lateral security cooperation is the only solution to this global threat. We must all work together to ensure that criminals, terrorists and narco-traffickers can find no shelter and no safe haven."
The top U.S. diplomat also reiterated President George W. Bush's commitment to developing trade between both countries underpinned by the belief that economic development is far more effective than aid in building a country's prosperity.
"Trade will be the most important element in Jamaica's development," she said, noting that Jamaica exported some US$500 million in goods to the United States. She also noted that some 800,000 tourists from the U.S. visit Jamaica annually while some 60 per cent of Jamaica's remittances originate from the United States.
LaGrange Johnson gave the assurance that while the U.S. would pursue bilateral, regional and global trade agreements, it would "maintain focus on the Free Trade Areas of the Americas (FTAA) as a
priority in the Western Hemisphere."
