(Barbados Today) The President of the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB), Dr. Warren Smith, stressed at yesterday’s 50th Annual Meeting of the Bank’s Board of Governors that in the small Caribbean economies with no reserve currencies, sustainable advances in standards of living must be driven by export expansion.
“A diversified production structure helps to build economic resilience, making economies less susceptible to price and output fluctuations. Such a diversified structure also leads to low cost, productive and competitive economies”, Smith said.
The CDB president emphasised that Caribbean countries needed to find a way to get the private sector to assume its place as the ultimate generator of jobs, incomes, and exports.
In order to make this happen, the public sector needs to pay much more attention to creating an ecosystem that includes climate-friendly infrastructure, a healthy and skilled labour force, enabling legislative and regulatory frameworks, enabling culture, and access to appropriate types of finance.
