Responsibilty is difficult as is important

It is known that if you spend more than you have, then you must have a deficit. We are not just taught this as children, but experience it as we are growing up. The nice pair of shoes that we see advertised on Mapin TV or the Michael Jordan jersey seen at Grand Bazzar, gives us a sense that we now belong to the global community.

How ironic, that the people that are advertising these products to us, themselves do not buy anything from us. Speaking to a few of my friends in Dominica, it has become quite apparent that our hard earned money is being pilfered from us to line the pockets of some fat cat somewhere in the west, with his Rolls Royce motor car and his Cigar.

Ask the average Dominican what was the GDP of Dominica last year and you would struggle to get the answer. This may either be because people don't care or are not informed about this vital information. Ask the second question, and the same facial expression would be evident.

Last year and every year for the last decade our imports have surpassed or exports. This has meant the IMF putting restrictions and clauses as to how we run our economy, only to benefit fat cats in the west and to the detriment of local Dominicans such as teachers and doctors and nurses. When are Dominicans going to wake up and smell the coffee.

Every time you turn on the TV, every few minutes is an advert about some American product that they claim will make you look more beautiful and hence make you happy. Can you tell me anyone in the west who is truly happy? They want to be more like us i.e. (natural, relax, spiritual, god fearing etc, etc) at the same time we want to be more like them. Many of them are obese and clinically over-weight from eating too much junk food/fast food. Many of them cannot even boil an egg. I have been told that they will even burn water. I know that you may think that I am joking, but this is no joke. If something bad happens, welfare recipients simply expect the government to take care of it- plain and simple in the west.

     Unfortunately, this is not the case in the Caribbean. It is usually up to those with relations overseas to help and donations from those who care about rebuilding the nation. The days of the 'saving for a rainy day' has now in a large part, disappeared from our discipline. We do not have oil, gold or diamonds. What do we have to offer? Why should any tourist visit us? Are our resources sustainable? Can we still be conservative in our thinking, but yet go forward? Do we still have respect for our religious leaders?

     It is time that Dominicans invest in their own destiny and not just become a nation of spenders, but an articulate bunch of people that have something to offer to the rest of the world, whether it is human resource, making use of the time difference between the west and Dominica. Subsistence production of fruits and vegetables, fish to be canned, or poultry rearing, [will] reduce or eliminate the need for unnecessary imports.

ulrick Pacquette