John Rapley - Rudolph Brown/Chief Photographer
EARLY IN the life of the Jamaican Economy Project, when it remained little more than a brainchild and a few documents, the committee behind its creation confronted the question of how such a
project would be funded.
The project's goal, after all, was ambitious: to conduct the most comprehensive study ever of the Jamaican economy in order to produce a blueprint for development that could put
the country on a path of high long-term growth.
Speculation and brainstorming are free and, indeed, as project chairman John Rapley remarked recently, "The airwaves of the nation are filled with it each morning and evening." But since so much of it remains largely uninformed, or based on dated research, the country seems to have struggled to find a dynamic path.
RESEARCH NOT CHEAP
However, credible research, as all the participants in the project knew, would not be cheap. To conduct extensive data collection, survey the existing literature, and study comparative cases would require perhaps dozens of researchers. To then sift through the material and produce coherent documents would further necessitate the services of many more.
The project benefited immensely from the commitment and generosity of its participants. From the advisory committee on down, many people volunteered to work on the project for free, seeing it as an opportunity to contribute to their nation's future. Others, particularly younger scholars with education loans to pay or young families to support, agreed to work for almost nominal wages.
Even then, the costs were going to run well into the millions. An office had to be maintained, travel expenses for Jamaicans working on the project abroad had to be paid, and the mere cost of driving people around for interviews ran up bills. Add to that the desire of the project's architects to communicate the findings to the public, and the bill was quickly going to run into the tens of millions.
TWO OPTIONS
"We faced two options," noted Rapley. The first, and most obvious one, was to approach an international financial institution or large foreign foundation for a grant. The other was to beat the bushes locally, raising funds from private donors within Jamaica. The committee opted for the second approach. It would, it was true, be far more taxing. For in the place of a well-crafted proposal, the fund-raising team anchored by Imani Duncan and Keith Collister, and assisted by the advisory committee would have to engage in a seemingly endless series of phone calls, lunch meetings, speeches and door-knocking to scrape the funds together.
It was indeed taxing. But the reason for choosing such a time-consuming approach emerged at a seminal discussion around a table one evening. As the advisory committee pondered the matter, one member, Damien King, had something of an epiphany. "This is all about taking responsibility," he remarked, in the process giving the project the name by which it would henceforth be known "taking responsibility for our country's future."
All agreed, and the implication was obvious. The Jamaican Economy Project would be a home-grown affair, from conception to birth to maturation. Engineered by Jamaicans, it would have to be owned by them too.
It has been a challenging task. Nevertheless, the determination of the team to see the project through to completion has kept it alive. "There were times it felt like the bailiff would bang at the door any minute," laughed John Rapley, referring to the shoestring budget and tight cash flow the project has sometimes had to cope with.
HALF OF BUDGET RAISED
Still, roughly half of the $30 million budget has now been raised. "It is a testament to the doggedness of our team," added Rapley, "but also to the love of Jamaica that many donors some of whom wish to remain anonymous show." Meanwhile, the project team has entered what it hopes will be the terminal phase of the fund-raising campaign, whereby it will seek to secure the commitments needed to see the project through to its final report at the end of this year.
Not all those approached to support the project have shown the same enthusiasm as those participating in it. The fund-raising team has encountered its share of cynicism, resignation or just plain complacency on the part of some donors. In a moment of exasperation one team member couldn't help but note that the same people heard complaining on the radio that the nation was in a crisis sometimes failed to register that urgency in their own behaviour.
Nevertheless, for every complacent individual, there has been another who has leapt at the opportunity to have an impact on his or her country's future. And that, for those beating the bushes, has been enough to keep them going.
