T&T Road Runners take on a World Marathon Major at the fastest course in the Americas

DATELINE: Chicago Marathon, October 11, 2009

It is a 1°C autumn morning but with the breeze it is freezing to the bone. Team FourTen (named after their dormitory accommodation, room #410) moves briskly to the seeded pre-assigned corrals, immediately behind the fastest 100 runners, to await the 7:30 am start of the 32nd annual Chicago Marathon.
The 7 man team comprises Gustavo Esquerra of Colombia, Jön Haraldsson of Iceland and, from Trinidad and Tobago, the TT Road Runners team of Learie Lezama, Glen Doyle, Darrin Grenade, John Lum Young and Alfred Patrick. Injured Patrick is under strict doctor’s orders not to run. He is disappointed but quickly puts his pain aside to cheer on his fellow TT Road Runners.

Runners about to leave Room #410 for start of race. Photo courtesy Alfred Patrick

 At the starting point, everyone is keyed up to race their hearts out. The energy is electric. After all, this is Chicago, a WorldMarathonMajor and the fastest course in the Americas. Esquerra, Lezama and Grenade head to Corral A while Haraldsson, Doyle and Lum Young stop at Corral B.
Gustavo, Darrin and Jön are in great shape but for Learie, Glen and John, running hard is a very high risk strategy. Regardless of confidence and in spite of pep talk, the demands of this marathon will expose any limitations.
The race starts on time and the field of 34,792 is off and running. They will run through Chicago neighbourhoods accompanied by loud encouragement from 1.5 million cheering spectators on pavements and bleachers from start to finish.
 Team FourTen welcomes the quick pace because they are eager to start running in the freezing cold. From Corral A Gustavo is flying, then Darrin with Learie content to stay on Darrin’s shoulder. Back in Corral B Jön is also out fast with Glen and John in pursuit.
By the third mile all 6 are on pace. Suddenly, directly in front of Jön, a runner falls. Haraldsson just manages to leap over the unfortunate runner. That was close. Let’s hope that burst of energy is not missed in the home stretch. 
Approaching mile 4, fatigue descends on John; a cumulative tiredness, not from the morning’s effort but from recent marathons, the last being 6 weeks ago. John instinctively realises the morning will be long, painful and brutal. Will he slow down? This is Chicago. He sticks to the game plan keeping Glen in sight.
At mile 5 Glen discards garbage bag poncho and extra t-shirt. He is cold but running smoothly. John ditches his poncho too but keeps the two extra tees. If he breaks down he will have 4 layers to stave off hypothermia.

From left are Jön Haraldsson, Gustavo Esquerra, John Lum Young, Glen Doyle, Alfred Patrick, Darrin Grenade and Learie Lezama.

Up ahead the other four are running fast but comfortably. A neon sign indicates a temperature of 5°C; between the buildings is warmer than at the open lakeshore start line. But it is still very cold. Even in gloves their finger tips are numb.
 Mile 6…mile 7…mile 8… the mile markers are prominent; in your face. John does not want to see the markers. To him they are just a bold herald of ach painful mile. To the others the markers are being knocked off with relative ease. John loses touch with Glen’s pace group.
Learie is having a rough time through mile 10 but mentally he is strong and fully focussed on the game plan. He knows he has to outlast the bad feeling.
Gustavo, Darrin, Learie, Jön and Glen pass the 13.1 mile mark (half way point) in that order and on schedule pace. Unknowing to Glen, John is 5 minutes behind. But Glen thinks John is ahead and it spurs him on.
Mile 16 and John is in real trouble now. He can no longer sustain the speed. He finally cuts pace to survival mode, repeatedly muttering to himself that yes, he can complete the remaining 10 miles.
For John the mile markers are passing slowly, too slowly, now. To make the miles disappear Lum Young reflects on some of this morning’s heroes:
• Like 83 year-old Iris Vinegar of North Carolina who had major heart surgery in January this year and vowed to run an autumn marathon if she survived the operation. Chicago is her 10th marathon; her first was run at age 73.
• Like the nine runners this morning who have run this race since its inception in 1977 completing all 31 previous editions.
• Like Jeff Albee, policeman, who in 2002 tore all the ligaments in his knee and shattered the femur whilst chasing a suspect. Doctors said he was unlikely to walk again and would have to resign from the police service. He refused to accept their verdict. In 2007, after five years of rehabilitation and two surgeries, he was finally able to run pain free. He then set his sights on Chicago 2009. (His daughter is running at his side to ensure he crosses that finish line.)

Haraldsson and Doyle at Mile 27 Post Race Party. Photos courtesy Jön Haraldsson

• Like Verdo Gregory* whose goal is to achieve a personal best marathon run of 2hrs and 40mins by the fall of 2009. Three weeks earlier at the Berlin Marathon he made his first attempt, missing the mark with a 2:46 effort. He is trying again for that elusive 2:40.

Mile 18 is a critical juncture. Most are exhausted. All are faced with one simple choice: maintain pace and hurt in the hope of doing well or reduce speed and hurt and accept the consequences.
This is Chicago; so for Team FourTen the only acceptable option is digging deep. Gustavo wills himself to stay ahead of the second pace group and Darrin prays not to disappoint his personal trainer. Learie is hurting; he hums “no retreat, no surrender”. Jön concentrates on target pace. Glen draws on his wife and son for inspiration.
At this stage of the race and every inch to the finish, things can go wrong, even for John who cut his speed hoping to make it home.
Mile 21. Their muscles are screaming, the pain is excruciating but they hold pace. In addition Jön’s right knee is paining; he hopes it does not worsen.
They push on. This is marathon running!
Mile 24 and it’s pain like never before.
Finally, a marker announces “1 Mile To Go.”
Alfred is at the Grant Park finish line as the first of Team FourTen approaches. He knows the pain. He is also familiar with the moment when the hurt transforms into a sweet pain before being replaced by the euphoria of a job well done.
Patrick sees men and women break into tears on crossing the line; for sure each has a story to tell.
All in all, Team FourTen had a good Chicago with G. Esquerra, D. Grenade and J. Haraldsson running personal bests, L. Lezama and G. Doyle running their fastest in years and J. Lum Young surviving the 26.2 miles.

Author’s Notes:
*Verdo Gregory completed the 2009 Chicago Marathon in 2:39
The writer is grateful to Glen Doyle for vividly relating the essence of marathon running.

The following paper titled “The Macro Economic Framework: Valid Theory and Policy Choice”
was presented at the Conference on the Economy, 2009 which was hosted by the
Department of Economics, University of the West Indies, St Augustine, on September 30, 2009.

By Eric St Cyr

I wish to make one point.  If economic theory is to be of assistance in guiding policy it must be both valid and relevant to the context.  We know from elementary logic that valid argument will never lead from true premises to false conclusions.  We know further that relevant theory must be scientific; its premises must be empirically tested.  Only then can its predictions of the unknown be trusted.  With these methodological building blocks in place I give two examples illustrative of the consequences of the use of invalid theory and proceed to make the case for our continuing search for a usable theory of Caribbean Economy.
Example One: A classic example of economic theory leading to social disruption because it did not apply was the cut in wages in Britain in 1926.  It led to the General Strike.  Neo-classical macro-economics held that the forces of supply and demand in the labour market determined both the real wage and level of employment.  Through the operation of an aggregate production function this level of employment determined the level of aggregate output.  Assuming with Say’s Law that ‘supply creates its own demand’ the goods market would also clear at full employment since the output that was not used in current consumption would be invested, interest rates adjusting to bring savings and investment into equality.  Money was assumed to be neutral; variation in its supply simply determined the nominal price level, that is, its purchasing power.
When, following on World War I and its many disruptions to economic life, there began to emerge open unemployment in Britain, the economic wisdom of the day diagnosed the cause as the downward inflexibility of the real wage and the solution as the reduction of the money wage.  This led to widespread social disruption and to re-evaluation of the theory.  Out of this came the Keynesian revolution, inter alia shifting focus to the determinants of aggregate demand and to financial markets.
Enough has been said here to make the following points: economic theory is valid in its context; societies evolve and contexts change; social institutions are key elements in historical contexts.
Example Two: The very distinguished West Indian Nobel Laureate in Economics, Sir Arthur Lewis, proposed in his 1950 paper “The Industrialisation of the British West Indies”, a strategy which has been dubbed ‘industrialisation by invitation’.  As implemented, this strategy has not produced the anticipated results because the analysis on which it was based did not explicitly distinguish between an offshore sector of Caribbean economy, where foreign enterprise and capital have always had sway, and an onshore sector where the residentiary population operates.  Lewis’ theory needed to be more precisely located in Caribbean empirical reality.
The problem Lewis addressed was the low level of income which the Caribbean economy of 1950 afforded its members.  To Lewis, low incomes resulted from low productivity in its principal industry, namely agriculture.  In order to raise factor productivity, agriculture needed to be mechanized to raise the land/man ratio since output per acre already compared favourably internationally but output per man was low.  There was however a severe constraint on land space in these small island territories of mountainous terrain. Labour, therefore, had to be removed from the land to make room for mechanization.  In the European experience, with which he was familiar, this was achieved by shifting labour from agriculture to manufacturing, from the land to the factory. 
The Lewis strategy thus required that manufacturing industry be established as necessary to raising productivity in agriculture.  There were, however, the problems of capitalizing manufacturing and finding markets for its output.  This is the context in which foreign investors were to be invited to establish and capitalize their enterprises and produce for overseas markets initially.  The record shows that Caribbean governments gave generous incentives to foreign capital through the various Pioneer Industries Ordinances, and that there was much foreign capital invested throughout the Caribbean.  The vast bulk of the investments, however, went into resource-based industries in the offshore sector -  petroleum in Trinidad, bauxite in Guyana and Jamaica, tourism in Barbados, Bahamas and the OECS, sugar in Trinidad, Guyana and Belize, citrus in Belize and bananas in the OECS.  Few investments were made onshore complementing the surplus labour in that sector.  It needs to be said that Lewis was not unaware of the existence of what he called a ‘West Indian peasantry’ onshore; nor of the downside of foreign investment. He, in fact, stated that foreign capital would be less dangerous in manufacturing than in resource-based industries.

The point of this example is that Lewis’ strategy which proved to be successful in South-east Asia rather missed the mark in the Caribbean by the theory on which it was based not having taken account of historical and institutional factors unique to the Caribbean.
The 19th century English economist John Stuart Mill denied the existence of a Caribbean economy, regarding these parts as the place where Britain produced her tropical staples.  Sir Arthur Lewis was clear that received economic theory did not apply wholesale everywhere; which led him to articulate in his “Economic Development with Unlimited Supplies of Labour” (Manchester School, 1954), a model tailor-made for Egypt, India or Jamaica.  However, it was the English economist/statistician Dudley Seers who made the methodological point most clearly in his “The Limitations of the Special Case” (Bulletin of the Oxford Institute of Economics and Statistics, 1962).  This writer has surveyed the literature in “The Theory of Caribbean Economy: Its Origins and Current Status”, (Institute of International Relations Occasional Papers #4, 1983) and gone on to state some basics in his “Some Fundamental Propositions in the Theory of Caribbean Economy” (Social and Economic Studies, Vol 40 No 2, 1991).  However it is to the pioneering work of Lloyd Best - “Outlines of a Model of Pure Plantation Economy” (Social and Economic Studies, Vol 17, 1968), the summary statement of George Beckford’s (ed.) Caribbean Economy (ISER,1975) and to the recently published book by Lloyd Best and Kari Levitt, Plantation Economy, that the perspective given here owes lineage.
Caribbean-type economy, of which Trinidad and Tobago is today the classic case, is externally propelled.  It is neither export led, like resource scarce Japan or resource rich New Zealand, nor is it internally propelled by technical innovation and investment like the USA or the European Common Market.  It is only over the last 500 years of modern world history that the Caribbean as we know it has come into existence, its institutions and culture shaped by the main actors of this era.  With less than 50 years of independence, opportunity for self knowledge and self determination remains rudimentary.
There seems to be compelling grounds for treating the economy, not as a monolithic whole, but as comprising two quite distinct parts, namely an onshore and an offshore sector.  This dichotomy, it seems to us, makes for more meaningful analysis than such other classifications as Lewis’ “modern versus traditional” or Ricardo’s “agricultural versus industrial”.  Moreover, because of the way that our populations have arisen and our nations have come to independence a central role must be ascribed to the state, both as an axis of economic power and in the determination of policy direction.  We thus have, as the structure of the economy, an offshore and an onshore sector mediated by a state sector.
The legacy of history has been that domestic resources have been harnessed for use by overseas enterprise and capital for the production of staples for export markets, the driving force being the maximization of returns to foreign capital realizable in foreign exchange.  At some time the very population and labour force comprised chattel capital to be optimally utilized towards the objective of the enterprise.  In other words, resource use was not aimed at maximizing the welfare of the human resource in these hinterlands of exploitation.  The consequence of this historical legacy is that the society is still, not only externally propelled, but highly externally oriented, dependent as it still is on overseas supplies for provisioning, with the implication that the earning of foreign exchange remains critical to survival and welfare.
The bare bones of the operation of the economy might now be modeled.  International enterprises operating through their agents, the trans-national corporations (TNCs), identify a natural resource of interest; a concession is obtained from the authorities and investment made to exploit the resource; in the process some local factors (mainly labour) are employed and paid, and royalties and taxes are paid to the state based on production and prices; in turn the state monetizes its receipts from offshore revenues and from taxes on local factor incomes and corporations and injects resources onshore in the process of providing governmental services; purchases from all these incomes are made from businesses onshore from which further incomes and taxes accrue; and so on.  Thus the economy is driven externally, its fortunes ebbing and flowing with activity worldwide, and in the offshore sector which constitutes the virtual engine.  This pattern has resulted historically in wide swings in the availability of foreign exchange, incomes, employment and tax revenue, and taking good years with bad low long-run average welfare.
The stated goal of economic policy, vociferously and aggressively pursued here in Trinidad and Tobago since independence, has been to raise the trajectory of long-run average income and reduce its volatility.  At the collective level this entails building up the stock of social capital and increasing the supply and distribution of public goods, while at the individual level maintenance of full employment at a living wage with stable prices.  It is not difficult to agree on these goals.  What’s debatable is how best to achieve them.

With the oil boom of 1973-82, the state in Trinidad and Tobago embarked on what we have termed the Point Lisas Strategy, namely using surplus revenues from the boom to secure the inflow of foreign exchange from direct state-owned investments in offshore production.  With the gas boom (1999-2008) this strategy has been resumed.  The success of this strategy would enable the state to maintain injections into the onshore economy thereby maintaining high levels of employment and money income.
While success with this strategy would reduce the dependence of the economy on foreign enterprise, it does not resolve the problem of its being prone to volatility or vulnerable to external shocks.  The question is whether the alternative of transforming the onshore sector of the economy from being a net foreign exchange user into a foreign exchange earner is not a more desirable long run strategy.  Such a strategy of Onshore Transformation would require surpluses now being earned offshore to be invested onshore to raise the productivity of the labour force and call forth productive enterprises onshore which are internationally competitive.  Might not this be what “developed nation status” really means and what a 20/20 Vision should entail?

Reports By CHRIS CHRISTO

MARATHON 1:
Panama City, August 09, 2009

Panama City Marathon from left: I Palma, M Duncan and J Lum Young.

Three marathons in eight days is an historic first for T&T; just the kind of challenge to attract the attention of T&T Road Runners Club’s Alfred Patrick and John Lum Young. Unfortunately Patrick, after months of preparation, is sidelined by injury leaving his teammate to get the job done. Can Lum Young do it?
At 5:15 in the pre-dawn hour, the 33rd Panama City Marathon is underway from Multiplaza Pacific Mall. No stars are visible in the dark sky. Good! Hopefully the cloud cover lasts. Panama City, at 9º north of the equator, is hot and the athletes are grateful to Mother Nature for any assistance.
Soon the runners turn on to the eastbound lane of Corredor del Sur. This section of highway is actually a bridge across the mudflats of Panama Bay leaving the coastal forests and mangroves intact. The country’s leaders accept that forests attract the rainfall necessary for an abundant supply of water to the rivers that feed the Panama Canal (the nation’s main revenue earner) and for the hydroelectric dams which provide 65% of Panama’s electricity. Consequently the country has extensive forest reserves to ensure their fresh water supply.
To the north is the lit church tower among the ruins of Panama Viejo.  The ruins are the first location of the town. Panama Viejo is in UNESCO’s World heritage List, probably because it is the oldest town on the Pacific Coast of the Americas. Established in 1519, sacked by pirate Henry Morgan in 1671 (who hiked across from the Atlantic), that site was abandoned and the town centre re-established 5 miles west at the other end of the Bay.
At daybreak the runners exit the highway to Costa del Este, an affluent district of skyscraper apartment complexes. New construction is taking place; no recession here it seems. A few kilometers past daybreak, Lum Young realises that there are no km markers on the marathon route. This is a challenge but he had seen a course map the day before and hopefully, will recall the landmarks in order to pace himself to the finish.
After about 11 kms the runners make an about-turn and head west retracing their steps. Pass the half way mark they continue west on Balboa Avenue alongside the recently opened Cinta Costera, a public recreational park on land reclaimed with material excavated from the wider locks being constructed on the Canal Zone.
The runners are soon at the Amador (a causeway linking outlying islands to the mainland). The Amador was built with material from the first Canal excavation.
Next is Casco Viejo, the old quarter where the administration of the town had relocated back in 1673 after that brazen pirate attack.  Suddenly, they are running among very dilapidated buildings. After affluent neighbourhoods and modern business districts, the buildings of Casco Viejo are a shocking contrast and seem to be in a totally different era and country. Although the structures are condemned by the authorities, people dwell in these buildings because of another law stating that they cannot be removed without proper compensation. Casco Viejo is also a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
After the western turnaround, it’s back east and over the flyover. On the descent to Cinta Costera the view of modern Panama City is spectacular; very tall buildings dominate the skyline from Patilla Point to Cangrejo. The cloud cover is no more and the sun is out in all its strength sapping glory but the finish is only a few kms away.
With the first race over, Patrick reminds Lum Young to remain focused because the tougher runs are ahead.

MARATHON 2:  Fallasburg, Michigan, August 15, 2009

Approaching the finish in Fallasburg Marathon.

Six days later, Lum Young is at the start of the 3rd Fallasburg Marathon in the picnic area overlooking Flat River. The organisers do not hide the fact that this hilly trail run is one tough 42.2 km course with two different loops of 21.1 kms in Fallasburg Park. The weather prediction of 24º C promises a race that will be all the more testing.
Lum Young remembers Patrick’s advice and takes his time because marathon #3 is less than 24 hours away. 
The runners cross Flat River via the restored Fallasburg Covered Bridge, one of only three covered bridges in Michigan open to vehicular traffic. (There is a sign on the bridge stating “$5 fine for driving or riding on this bridge faster than a walk”.) Immediately on leaving the bridge the marathoners face a steep climb. In fact the first loop is laced with hills through scenic country roads, paved and unpaved, and some trail along the banks of Flat River.
Isolated farm houses and cottages place items for sale near the roadside- everything from garden produce and handicraft to used tyres and firewood. The prices are marked; one simply takes the desired item and leaves the money in a designated box or bowl. Not a soul in sight but there isn’t any need for an attendant as the countryside because here, the honour system works.
The day is getting hot but the second loop is mainly in the deep shade of the forest. Lum Young, having passed the halfway mark, is in a good mood and picks up the pace amongst the cool of the trees. What is he doing?! Hope he does not pay the price for this exuberance.
From down a gutter some big animal can be heard moving through the bramble but John needs to keep his eyes on the uneven trail.
As the athletes cross into another section of forest, a huge sign indicates a public hunting area. This adds urgency to tired legs. But most have to slow down for the big hills packed in between kilometres 32-39. The temperature is rising now but Flat River is not too far away and soon it is the final climb to the finish line.

MARATHON 3: Waterloo,
Ontario, August 16, 2009

The next morning, Leg 3 gets underway at the 7th ENDURrun Marathon in Waterloo. Lum Young finds the going hard from the start but he knows many of the participants and race volunteers and so is committed to completing the race.
The first 21.1 kms of the two loop course seems to take forever…seems to be unending…seems to challenge John’s commitment. But the encouragement from runners and volunteers keeps Lum Young putting one foot ahead of the other. Perhaps he is paying the price for the acceleration in the cool forests of Fallasburg Park.
On the second loop, the race director shouts: “How are you feeling?” “Terrible” is Lum Young’s response but he soldiers on. He is eager to get to the 32km mark because he knows at that point stopping is no longer an option because the shortest way back is to push on to the finish line.
At the 32 km water stop, Andy and Duff, two volunteers that John has raced against in the past, encourage him to keep going: “Way to go John, you can do it”. Lum Young tries to shout back but a barely audible “yea man” comes out. His strides get shorter and shorter…the muscles scream. His only comfort is the confidence that he can run 10k any day of the week.
Soon the 42km marker looms. Only 195 m more. At last the finish line and relief. Congratulations are in order on completion of the 5 Star MarathonManiacs Challenge.

A Monthly Round-Up of Business Headlines Across the Region

By REAY GREAVES

JAMAICA

Caribbean Airlines Ltd announced the appointment of Captain Ian Brunton as its new Chief Executive Officer. Brunton takes over from Philip Saunders, and has a long career as a pilot with the airline.

•National carrier Air Jamaica began laying off 300 workers on Monday in a move to further reduce its staff complement by 15 per cent.
•Digicel Group announced that its subscriber base hit 10 million customers in the 32 markets in which it does business globally.
•Telecommunications solutions company, Jamaica Newtork Access Point (JNAP) Ltd, has been acquired by the United States-based Digital Utilities Ventures Inc (DUTV), an outfit which specialises in the development of Internet protocol video transport systems.
•Cabinet cleared the way for Jamaica’s insurance companies to issue policies denominated in foreign currency, with oversight from regulator, the Financial Services Commission (FSC).
•RBTT Bank Jamaica Ltd announced a further reduction in its prime lending rate, which will cut the cost of borrowing by an additional 50 basis points. This brings to 150 basis points the net reduction in its lending rate over the two-month period, September to November.
•Scotiabank Jamaica announced that effective November 1st, it will cut its base lending rate by 62 basis points to 19.88 per cent, the second rate reduction announced by the bank in the past three months.
•NCB created a $1-billion fund priced at 9.0 per cent, a larger pool than the half-abillion loan window opened by Scotiabank Jamaica, which is selling its funds at 9.95 per cent.
•LIME filed a $100-million lawsuit against Digicel claiming that the Irish owned telecom unfairly priced its landline-to-mobile rates by as much as $2.48 per minute below the rate it charges LIME to terminate its landline calls.
TRINIDAD & TOBAGO

•In September, inflation continued its downward trend and fell to 4.3 percent, from 5.9 per cent in the previous month and from 11.6 per cent at the start of the year.
•RBTT announced that yet another woman had been chosen to assume the position as president and country head of the bank. Arvinder Bharath replaced Catherine Kumar, former head of the Bankers’ Association of Trinidad and Tobago.
•In an effort to boost trade between T&T and China, the Asian community in Trinidad and Tobago established The Chinese Chamber of Industry and Commerce of Trinidad and Tobago.
•The National Gas Company (NGC) was forced to reduce its supplies to large industrial customers in the country after gas giant bpTT had to restrict its supplies of offshore gas because of a malfunction at its Galeota facilities.
•In an interview in Buenos Aires, Argentina, Energy Minister Conrad Enill said the Government of Trinidad & Tobago is in talks with a Brazilian company to build an aluminum smelter on the island. The company seeks to build a smelter capable of producing 125,000 metric tons a year of the metal. 
•The Central Statistical Office (CSO) reported a 0.1 increase in the unemployment rate in the second quarter of this year, from 5.0 percent to 5.1 five percent in the first quarter. The rate was 4.6 for the second quarter of last year.
•The T&T Review of the Economy 2009 reported a decline in LNG exports to the United States, its major market, during the first seven months of the last fiscal year, while there was an increase in shipments to higher priced markets in Europe and Asia. Between October 2008 and April 2009, the United States received 129 billion cubic feet, or 33.2 percent, of the country’s total liquefied natural gas exports.
•Caribbean Airlines Ltd announced the appointment of Captain Ian Brunton as its new Chief Executive Officer. Brunton takes over from Philip Saunders, and has a long career as a pilot with the airline.
•Trinidad and Tobago was voted “Island of the Year” by Caribbean Travel and Living Magazine as part of its Caribbean Travel Awards. The Caribbean Travel Awards have been around for 15 years and are regarded by many in the industry as the “Oscars” of the Caribbean.
•The National Insurance Board (NIB) increased its shareholding in both Republic Bank Ltd (RBL) and Trinidad Cement Ltd (TCL). NIB now holds 27,960,429 shares or 17.41 per cent of the issued capital of RBL. The board increased its shares in TCL to 25,367,032 shares or 10.16 per cent of TCL’s issued share capital.
•The Industrial Court granted Hilton workers a wage increase of 11.5 per cent.
•The Trinidad and Tobago Unit Trust Corporation’s (UTC) announced that its TT Dollar Income Fund has crossed $10 billion. The milestone was achieved on October 9 and UTC said the fund was its fastest growing product with over 400,000 customers.
•NIS General Manager (ag) Doreen Nelson said NIS expenditure on benefits was rising faster than income from contributions. Total contributions to the NIS rose 117% between 1999 and 2009 while the increase in the payment of benefits for the same period was 224%.
•Methanol Holdings (Trinidad) Limited commissioned its new US$1.7b ammonia AUM plant.
•Nutrimix Feeds Ltd announced a drop in live broilers to $3.99 per pound in what the company termed a “pre Christmas sale”.

BARBADOS

•Consumers started paying less for gasoline as the retail price decreased by eight cents from $2.38 per litre to $2.30 per litre. The price of diesel fell by seven cents from $2.04 to $1.97 per litre, while the retail price of kerosene went to $1.19 per litre – a saving of seven cents.
•According to the company’s financial report for the nine-month period ending June 30, 2009, Barbados National Bank’s (BNB) consolidated net profit after taxation was Bds$35.8 million, representing a decline of 20.5 per cent when compared to the $45 million earned for the same period in 2008.
•Following several years of deterioration in credit metrics, Moody’s Investors Service downgraded Barbados’ government bond ratings to Baa3 foreign currency government bond rating and Baa2 local currency government bond rating from Baa2 and A3 respectively.

HAITI

•Foreign investors gathered in Haiti for a special conference with UN Special Envoy Bill Clinton. The two-day conference was organized by The Inter-American Development Bank at the request of the Haitian government. Organisers hoped it will attract the much needed capital to the country and improve its image in the eyes of the international business community.
VENEZUELA

•Hoping to exploit the reserves in the area of the Deltana Platform, Venezuela’s state oil company—Petroleos de Venezuela SA (PDVSA) purchased ConocoPhillips’ 40 per cent stake in a joint natural gas venture with Chevron Corp.
•Petroleos de Venezuela SA pulled out as a joint-venture partner to help Vietnam’s state oil company build a third refinery.
•A decision was reached to implement a single currency for transactions among the member states of the Venezuela led trade and economic bloc- the Bolivarian Alliance for the Americas (ALBA). The decison was reached at The Seventh Summit of the ALBA.
•Guyana and Venezuela entered into a US$18.8 million (GY$3.7 billion) export deal that will see Guyana exporting over 50,000 tonnes of rice to Venezuela.
•Petroleos de Venezuela SA boosted a bond sale to $3.26 billion from $3 billion to meet local investor demand for dollar-based assets.

OTHER REGIONAL

•Figures from the Caribbean Tourism Organisation (CTO) show a 90 per cent downturn in tourist arrivals for the region from January to July 2009. Countries such as Antigua and Barbuda, The Bahamas, Barbados, Bermuda, Cancun, Mexico, Cayman Islands and Grenada, have so far experienced staggering double-digit decline over the period compared to 2008. Cuba and Jamaica are the only countries that have scraped with minimal increases of 3.1 per cent and 3.4 per cent in growth, respectively.
•A United States think tank issued a dire warning about the latest impact of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) on developing countries. The Centre for Economic and Policy Research (CEPR) released a discussion paper in which it argues that 31 of 41 of countries with current IMF agreements have been subjected to harmful monetary and fiscal policies.
•St Kitts/Nevis established diplomatic relations with Finland and Estonia. The necessary diplomatic instruments was signed at a ceremony at the Permanent Mission of Finland to the United Nations
•Statements from the Bahamas International Securities Exchange’s (BISX) showed that for the nine month period ended June 30, 2009, All Share Index declined by 12 percent, with market capitalisation plummeting by $407 million.
•The governments of Barbados and Canada and the Caribbean Regional Negotiating Machinery (CRNM) signed a Canadian $2.5m agreement. The agreement hopes to enable the region to develop its capacities to engage in international trade negotiation arenas.
•Regional air carrier LIAT marked 53 years of continuous service to the Eastern Caribbean.
Bernuda concluded a bilateral agreement with Aruba that provides for a full exchange of information on criminal and civil tax matters between Bermuda and Aruba.
•A High Court ordered the liquidation of the Grenada Today newspaper after the owners failed to reach an agreement with former Prime Minister Keith Mitchell over the settlement of an EC$191,000 (US$71,135) award.

By ROMAIN PITT

Congratulations are in order for the Trinidad and Tobago team who have produced some really splendid performances in India.  There is no doubt their success is attributable in part to the unstinted support they received from the cricket authorities, media and fans from back home.
In my observations in the October edition of this paper, I noted the shoddy treatment of West Indies players by the West Indies Cricket Board (WICB), the attitude of some commentators to the players, and the possible impact on West Indies cricket.  I want here to provide some examples, limiting my comments to only the most talented of the cricketers, and the most egregious circumstances, and to urge that the Board do much better in the future.

Brian Lara

In 1973-74, the WICB waged war with the world’s greatest cricketer, Sir Garfield St Aubrun Sobers, requiring him to prove his physical fitness, as if the great man would conceal injuries so that he could be selected to play for his country.
Rohan Kanhai was the coach of the team of 1992-93, the last team to defeat Australia at home until the South Africans did it this year.  His term as coach ended shortly thereafter.
The Board refused to budge when, in 1992, Sir Vivian Richards requested one last World Cup opportunity before retirement.  For most of his career, Sir Viv was regarded not only as the greatest batsman of his era but as the best conditioned cricketer ever to have played the game.
In the late nineties, the Board turned their guns on Desmond Haynes who was, in the view of many, one of the greatest openers ever. They accused him of failure to comply with regulations requiring participation in the domestic tournaments as a condition of selection.  The Board failed to apply the “spirit of the law” that is so often applied to avoid calamitous decisions.  The consequences of that battle were the premature end to Haynes’ career and the beginning of our decline.
Brian Lara and the Board were locked in combat during Lara’s entire captaincy.  The Board could not handle a sensitive genius with a progressive outlook.  Compare the treatment India’s Sachin Tendulkar and Australia’s Ricky Ponting receive from their respective Boards with that visited upon Lara by our Board.  It has been left to Trinidad and Tobago to honour the man who has thrilled more crowds than most artistes in show business.
It took a tough stand by the selectors against the Board to have Chris Gayle appointed captain.  The problem is an old one; the Board judges the book by its cover.  They cannot see Gayle’s natural leadership skills; they are constantly demanding apologies from a captain who has no reason to apologize.
Three years ago, Fidel Edwards was exposed to the possibility of unnecessary injury when an umpire in New Zealand stopped him in full flight to signal a boundary. On that same tour, after Gayle struck two sixes, the umpire replaced a 35-over-old ball with a 12-over-old ball.  Nothing was done about either incident. 
When Daren Powell was the victim of the most disgustingly abusive gesture from the captain of the New Zealand team in the latest series in that country, the Board did nothing and Tony Cozier, our most influential commentator, suggested that Powell deserved what he got.  (Incidentally, New Zealand won the prize for sportsmanship for that year, a period which includes this horrible incident.)
Perhaps the most painful case is that of Marlon Samuels who was suspended in May 2008 for a period of two years. Before going into more detail on Samuels’ case, let me call attention to Mohammed Asif of Pakistan, who was suspended six months ago for alleged possession of heroin and is already playing for his country once more.  Samuels was convicted of the offense of engaging in an activity that brought himself or the game into disrepute. 
I will limit my comments to what the Tribunal said about the case.  First of all, the Tribunal went out of its way to clarify that Samuels was not found guilty of match fixing.  What was most significant and relevant for this article is the following. The Tribunal characterized the two-year suspension as “entirely disproportionate to the circumstances”. It noted that in the absence of the mandatory minimum penalty it “would have recommended that Samuels be bound over to be of good behaviour for a period not exceeding two years”. Finally, it recommended that the WICB “need to take up with the ICC as a matter of urgency the prospect that Samuels could be banned from playing cricket for two years when it has not been proven by the committee that he did anything dishonestly or for a corrupt purpose”.  The Board promised to help Samuels.  Even Cozier, in an April 5 cricinfo article conceded that Samuel’s conduct which resulted in his suspension was naïve, and recognised his potential importance to the West Indies team.
 I have made several inquiries to determine if the promised assistance was forthcoming; the conclusion is clear that no such help has been given.
The Samuels case cries out for attention. Few commentators have noted that most of the performances that have marked Samuels as an exceptional cricketer were produced overseas rather than at home.  For example, there is his first Test century in India in 2002, a match-winning century in the last ODI against India in the same series that Carl Hooper and Gayle have described as the best they’ve seen, a double century (257) against Queensland, Australia, a feat that few visiting cricketers have ever achieved, in fact a record for that ground. There is also his leading the averages among batsmen on both sides on the WI’s 2007-2008 South Africa tour as well as an ODI performance at the Oval in London, England in 2007 that left old hands wondering whether they had ever seen such shots.  The fact that all these performances came abroad rather than at home may be more significant than is generally recognized.
 

Marlon Samuels

Samuels’ character references at the hearing included a judge, a senior police officer, Michael Holding and people of such stature.  The Board has done nothing to seek commutation of the sentence.  It takes very little contemplation to see that Samuels is a young man who needs help and can benefit from the Board’s support.  The vile rumour that he deliberately ran out Lara in the latter’s last game says more about the mentality of the rumour mongers than it does about Samuels’ character.
What has happened to Germaine Lawson who was banished shortly after his seven-wicket haul against Australia and then reinstated by the ICC?  The Board has shown no interest in his future.
Everyone hears of the injuries, the treatment and recovery of people like Kevin Pietersen and Andrew Flintoff, Ponting and Brett Lee.  When Dwayne Bravo, Jerome Taylor and Edwards were injured, there was no information offered about their progress.  In fact, what we heard from Bravo himself was that he had difficulty getting help in making his insurance claims.
The evidence is overwhelming and confirms what was told to me by someone in a position to know, which is that the WICB does nothing to help our cricketers, a state of affairs that must necessarily have a negative impact on the players’ performances.
Sometime in 2008, Jeff Dujon expressed in writing the view that the current bunch of cricketers were hopeless and that no coach could make a difference. Even if he is right – and I am certainly not prepared at this juncture to concede the point- we must actively support our cricketers and assist them by creating better conditions for them to thrive.
 If we continue to mistreat the players or to simply leave them on their own, we shall not improve significantly.  The competition is too intense.

Romain Pitt is a Grenada-born West Indies supporter who has lived in Canada for over 50 years and served as a judge of the Ontario Superior Court for the last 15.

By NATALIE BRIGGS

If nothing else, the plight of the Chinese worker in Trinidad today stands as a cautionary tale to his local counterpart who, if it ever comes to that, will not have the option of demanding to be returned to more congenial conditions at home.
As the local worker becomes sandwiched between Faster and Cheaper, these two monoliths of neo-liberal economic policy, he finds that his hours and duties have lengthened with a simultaneous shortening of wages, permanence and benefits. This new worker is a creature of the Washington Consensus, a worldwide attempt to reduce the impact that labour agitation has on free market forces, the bitter pill governments and private enterprise of developing countries are left to swallow as they cut back expenditure to survive in a global system run by the market.
The results aren’t pretty. Increasingly it seems that local labour institutions and even the movement itself are under attack. Government is moving to place the Cipriani Labour College under the aegis of University of Trinidad and Tobago; PTSC and TSTT have gone to the Industrial Court in an attempt to de-certify the recognised bargaining bodies for workers, the Transport and Industrial Workers and Communication Workers Unions. National union membership hovers somewhere around 20 percent as employees no longer see the benefit of joining a trade union and are further discouraged from accessing them through employers’ subtle threats to their jobs. What is worse is that the current incarnation of the labour movement appears unable to stop the onslaught.
Indeed as I glanced around the Cipriani Labour College’s auditorium for the opening night of its 43rd anniversary celebrations, this opinion seems to be confirmed. The night’s panel played before a steadily diminishing audience of FITUN regulars, college staff and students. As they preached to this congregation of the converted, the panel, consisting of labour powerhouses, FITUN’s David Abdulah, the OWTU’s Ancel Roget, All Sugar and General’s Rudy Indarsingh and CWU president Joseph Remy summed up the problems plaguing the movement. The most serious of course were outside of the control of the trade unions – the behaviour of government, the employer/capitalist class and even the workers themselves.
Abdulah said that the movement had become a victim of its own success. The employee had forgotten the struggles and the movement that had brought real and measurable improvements to their condition over the past seventy years. To top it off, government and the private sector were bent on following neo-liberal economic models that have been proven to no longer work. Roget’s contribution dealt with employers’ inability to come to the bargaining table in good faith and labour laws that were stacked in favour of business owners. Remy regretted the insidious conversion of the only genuine worker centred place of learning to an institution where the eventual marketability of the degree is paramount. All of the leaders present tenaciously clung to the exercise of labour’s major trump card, the strike, as a matter of course and not necessarily a last resort.
So, what is the way forward for the labour movement? Can a way forward be forged given the movement’s history, development and its adherence to what has worked in the past?
To find some answers to these questions I visited the offices of one trade union veteran, one economist and one industrial relations consultant.
Contrary to views expressed by his colleagues, BIGWU’s Vincent Cabrera maintains that one of the leading problems facing the labour movement comes from within. He says discord continues to plague trade unions. The comment called to mind the boast by the OWTU’s  Ancel Roget that his union is one of a few forming the vanguard against ‘reactionaries’ in the trade union movement. Recent months are littered with stories of in-fighting- FITUN and NATUC’s separate platforms at Labour Day celebrations this year, and the fallout between FITUN members and the PSA being two examples. Cabrera, who is also NATUC’s vice president, was confident however that his organization and its FITUN colleagues were moving closer to bridging the divide. He says “more and more unions on both sides of the fence are seeing the absolute necessity to work together to improve the lot of workers.”
“I think labour is heading in a very positive direction. There are obstacles; there are also weaknesses, particularly the capacity of the trade unions to deal with new and evolving situations.”
The unions have laid almost every labour and societal problem at the doorsteps of the ‘new economics’. Lay-offs, the migration to greater use of contract labour, the slowness of the Public Sector Negotiating Committee and other employers to resolve collective agreement issues in a timely fashion, even the increase in crime and violence are all consequences of capitalism gone bad.
But is this borne out by real life situations?
Economist and lecturer, Dr. Lester Henry says that while the adoption of neo-liberal economic policy has been good for the capitalist, it has resulted in a steady decrease in real wages and benefits for the worker since the 1970s.  Drawing reference to the current medical debate taking place in the US, he argues that the complete deregulation of the health sector has almost put the cost of medical care, (the onus of which remains on the worker, unsupported by government or the employer)  out of reach for the average American.
Dr. Henry contends that it isn’t just good moral sense to take care of the worker, but good economic sense as well. Healthier populations tend to lead to greater productivity and efficiency gains.
He also points out that neo-liberal economic policies tend to promote wide income disparities in populations and warns that continued adherence to this economic model could result in situations as in Mexico or Colombia, where ten percent of the population hold the wealth while everyone else lives in grinding poverty.
But will the unions’ usual response of forcing the hands of government and employers through strikes, calls for shutdowns and court action, be enough to counter neo-liberalism and its effects?
“New tactics are fine but the trade unions have to keep standing up. We can’t just blithely sit and join government and the employer. We have to attempt to reform the law as a moral duty…The trade union movement must understand that if it comes together things must happen.’ With reference to PTSC and TSTT, Cabrera continues, “ they never expected the trade union movement (both FITUN and NATUC) to start to protest the way we protested, which is why they told their people at the state companies to pull back.”
But this, at best is a temporary solution, since experience has shown it results in the setting of a new equilibrium point in hostilities between the parties, with tensions slowly building until the next big blow-out. Newton George, an Industrial Relations consultant, says some type of balance must be struck between the unions’ right to engage in industrial action and their responsibility to the labour relations process.
Far from seeing neo-liberal economics as the key determinant in the current worker/employer struggle, George believes it is more an issue of badly managed conflict resolution.
“There is a school of thought that comes out from the HR school of management which says that if we have proper human resource management there is no need for the union. Meanwhile, the labour relations school of thought says the unions are necessary to temper that balance of power between employer and worker. You have that conflict in between management and labour unions because of that dichotomy in ideology. And you have this exacerbated by the economic things that are taking place to produce now, to produce better, to produce things faster, to produce things cheaper.”

He believes solutions lie in education, that is more persons trained in conflict management. It is not enough to agitate for better laws, when there are few trained people to effect them. George says judgments handed down to by the Industrial Court should be made accessible and explained to the average worker. This way, labour relations do not remain distant to the everyday concerns of the employee. The IR consultant also thought that managers should encourage people to become more aware of industrial relations issues and saw a role for the Labour College in this.
Dr Henry’s solutions were more far-reaching, suggesting nothing short of the jettisoning of the neo-liberal model itself.
“At the heart of the neo-liberal is an offensive against developing countries and any kind of tendency towards humane development. They don’t want to see that because it affects their profits” he says.
One thing becomes apparent immediately though, the unions cannot continue on their current trajectory. One only has to remember the massive lay-offs of the 1980s and the effect on the trade union strength to this day to see why. Could the labour movement survive another period like that? The need for purposeful worker-centered trade union leadership becomes even more vital.

Industrial Strategy At The Crossroads

By Gregory McGuire

If nothing else, the impact of the global recession on the Trinidad and Tobago economy shouldserve as a potent reminder of theimperative of economic transformation—meaning reduced reliance on offshore energy-based rents. This is not by any means a new challenge.  However, after more than half a century of self-government and despite the efforts of successive administrations, economic transformation remains an elusive goal. Given the vulnerability exposed by the global slowdown, is it not time to revisit our approach to the challenge of economic transformation to sustainability? Having now seen its vulnerability can we continue to rely on the Point Lisas strategy to bring deliverance?
There is no doubt that the Point Lisas strategy of resource-based industrialization, hasyielded significant growth in the economy over the last thirty years.  This has been the dominant industrialization strategy pursued in two phases beginning with the   post 1974 oil boom.
In Phase 1, 1974 to 1983, the state played a central role in a deliberate strategy to monetize natural gas resources. The state injected US$ 3.3 billion in the development of a whole new industrial platform at the lead has been taken by foreign and local private capital in a massive expansion of the gas industry over the last 18 years.
Throughout it all, the state has continued to be an active facilitator in the process by providing infrastructure, competitive fiscal terms and where necessary, holding equity deemed.This period has witnessed capacity growth in ammonia, methanol gas processing, steel and LNG. However, the biggest contributor to growth of the industry and economy was the LNG business which commenced in 1999, and tripled capacity in the first half of this decade.  By 2005, thirty years after embarking on the path of resource-based industrialization, Trinidad and Tobago could boast of being the world’s largest exporter of ammonia and methanol, the fifth largest producer of LNG, and the leading exporter of LNG to the USA.  Whether we have been able to leverage these rankings is a debatable question.  Unfortunately, it may be argued that what the Point Lisas strategy achieved was not transformation of the economy. It fuelled several years of positive economic growth while simultaneously achieving successful diversification within the energy sector, displacing oil with natural gas and natural gas-based industry.  Table 1 shows the striking similarity in our energy sectordependence between the first boom period and today. Oil contributed 41% of GDP in 1974-78 compared with 45% of GDP thirty years later. Similarly, the share of energy (oil) exports of total exports was 93% in the years 1974-78 compared with 87.3% in the most recent five-year period.The energy sector share of Government revenue in the last five years was 57%, the same level as in the period 1979-1983.
As indicated in the last edition of the TTR, the prognosis is that growth in the energy sector is likely to be very slow over the next few years.  If the economy is to maintain output and employment levels and a stable exchange rate, it is imperative that new growth poles emerge. 
Governments always have been conscious of the situation. Unfortunately actions seldom match the chatter.   Our history shows that attempts at diversification have been given greatest focus when the lead energy sector appears to be on the wane.   This was the case during the ten years of recession 1984-83, when a package of fiscal incentives and a competitive exchange rate allowed the manufacturing sector to expand and prosper. It is not surprising therefore that, in today’s environment, talk of diversification has become the common mantra whenever the Government addresses the private sector. One hopes that this will not be a case of too little too late.
 As part of the Vision 2020 process, seven non-energy sectors were identified and targeted to lead the diversification thrust.  These are: yachting, merchant marine, food and beverage, printing and packaging, fish and fish processing, film and music and entertainment.   In addition,  Government has embarked on a major facility at the Tamana InTech Park which has been earmarked to house the ICT  and  other innovative industries.The basis and process of selection of these sectors are not clear.  However, strategic plans have been developed for each and, in some cases, special purpose industry facilitation and development companies have been formed   –e.g.   Trinidad and Tobago Entertainment Company, the Trinidad and Tobago Film Company and the Seafood Industry Development Company (SIDC).  

The general thrust of these companies is to provide trade, market and business development services to the targeted industry clusters.  The decision to remove the responsibility and impetus for planning and implementation from  the public service   to a special purpose vehicle provides each sector with a better chance of success.  Investigations reveal that despite financial constraints, progress is being made in some areas, particularly at the SIDC. While these initial steps are indeed encouraging, doubt lingers about the ability of these industries to meet the transformation challenge.
There are perhaps three key questions to be answered. The first is:Hve we targeted the right firms or sectors? Lloyd Best was always adamant that “effective development planning, whatever its horizon, must take as its point of departure some concrete interpretation of the way the economy is actually structured”. Best made the case for us to see the local economy as having two distinct components: the energy sector offshore and the rest of the economy- onshore. Government is the pipeline through which rents collected offshore are distributed onshore to stimulate economic growth. Economic transformation requires the   development of a vibrant and sustainable onshore sector- capable of earning foreign exchange and paying its way in the world. Within the onshore sector, Best distinguished between the satellite firm and the maroon firm. Satellite firms are those that are linked to energy sector activity and their fortunes rise and fall with the rhythm of foreign exchange generated offshore.  Maroon firms on the other hand are those firms that are autononous of the energy sector and which probably possess the capacity or potential for import replacement, export competition, foreign exchange self-sufficiency and long run viability. 
Research on “maroon firms” in the Caribbean has shown that they exhibit a comparatively high import productivity ratio- that is the rate at which it converts imports to foreign exchange earnings or savings.  In particular, these firms have the potential to survive and even prosper when the boom is done and the golden age is replaced by scarcity.   Best advocated the promotion of a cluster of maroon firms capable of being autonomous rather than looking offshore for one or other of scarce resources. Among the sectors targeted, the seafood industry, food and beverage industry and the entertainment industry are perhaps the ones with the highest population of maroon firms. Significantly, all three are characterized by a high proportion of local inputs, including raw material and know-how, strong domestic demand in a competitive market, and the potential for export.  It is apparent from the strategic plans, however, that more detailed micro level analysis needs to be done to find out more about these firms and their specific needs. In this regard, SIDC appears to be most advanced and getting the most traction.
Another problem with firms /sector definition arises from the philosophy underpinning the diversification strategy in general and the strategic plans in particular.   A common methodology in the Strategic Plans is the identification of what is called “international best practice” and determination of the gaps in the local industry. The recommended strategy is then targeted towards putting best practice in place in the local industry.  While this approach is not invalid, it does make the critical assumption that “best practice” is somehow universally applicable. In using this approach we run the risk of ruling out as deficient, defective or unimportant, any indigenous process or product that is not seen as part of the “best practice”.  Such thinking is perhaps a modern manifestation of the colonial mindset that continuously sees foreign as best.  One consequence of this can be seen in the manner in which the steelpan is addressed in the strategic plan for the entertainment industry. While this particular plan is loaded with important and useful information about the international industry, it treats scantily with the steelpan only from a manufacturing and export perspective. The potential of the panyard as a centre of learning   and the possibilities of the steel orchestra  as a maroon firm are notaddressed.
A second question to be considered is whether these sectors will receive the required level of Government support.  A common  error made by governments of resource-exporting countries isthat of being lured into a false sense of security by  the flood of foreign exchange coming from resource boom. When the boom is over very little remains after obligatory expenses are met.
Already there have been confirmed reports about smaller allocation in the current fiscal year.  This is really counter intuitive and driven by the short term needs to meet current expenses rather than the longer term transformation imperative.  Government has also been very tardy with respect to legislation.  At least five of the seven sectors targeted fordevelopment require amendments to outdated legislation in order to make meaningful progress. In some cases amendments have not even been drafted.   The case of Tobago is instructive.  Recognizing the vulnerability of the island to the vagaries of the international tourism industry and the limitations of the Tobago private sector, the THA  has led the way with new investments in the fishing industry including purchase of its own trawler and the establishment of a fish processing plant.  The THA plans to divest equity in these assets to Tobago stakeholders.  This is an excellent example of proactive Government, working with maroon firms to create a dynamic onshore sector.Government in Trinidad may wish to take example from the THA.  

T­he third question relates to the role of the private sector. Despite loud calls from the respective business Chambers for economic diversification, there are doubts about the willingness of the private sector to take up the challenge.  The likelihood of the dominant   local private investor attempting to expand into a new industry is arguably much greater during the periods of boom than in periods of contraction. During the latter period, the private sectorfirms, mainly offshore, and satellite firms are likelyto retain cash and wait until the business climate changes.  This behavior strengthens the case for focusing on the maroons firms, who, because they depend primarily on domestic inputs and markets, are well-placed to invest but may not even have been identified.
There is national consensus on the imperative of economic transformation. While several sectors have been targeted for intervention, their prospects for success may be dampened by the choice of firm/sector, fiscal and legislative constraintsand indifferent investors.   Given the imminent recovery in the global economy- and hence export commodity prices- a re-ordering of priorities in Trinidad cannot be ruled out. Diversification and transformation may again become second order priorities.  Hopefully Tobago will stay on course.

EARL BEST examines the current issues surrounding the WI captaincy

Darren Ganga

Since the start of the 2009 Champions League Twenty20 tournament in India last month, Daren Ganga’s stock has risen appreciably.  The kudos have not stopped coming in both for the Trinidad and Tobago team which, under his leadership, contrived to secure the runner-up spot in the tournament and for the skipper himself.  But not content with celebrating what was after all a completely unexpected performance by the national team, many have gone on to suggest a couple of changes that should come as a result. The first is that Trinidad and Tobago should replace the West Indies as the region’s Test-cricket playing side, a notion as preposterous as it is not novel. Frankly, I do not think it needs to be entertained at all except to say that it would not have arisen if the West Indies Cricket Board were taking its responsibilities seriously.
The second suggested change is that Chris Gayle must make way for Ganga at the helm of the regional team scheduled to tour Australia later this month because the latter has shown himself to be such an able leader in this tournament in particular. That is a not a novel idea, having been broached in the middle of the decade when T&T under Ganga began to emerge as a powerhouse of regional cricket. Recently, any number of people have climbed onto the Ganga for captain bandwagon, the identity of some of them surprising.
Former TIDCO Chairman Dr Brian Harry was the first one to run the Ganga idea by me. He has long been convinced that the T&T skipper had the stuff of which good leaders are made but was sadly lacking in confidence. “If we in the WI had a serious notion about development,” he wrote to me in 2007 when Ganga was handed the captaincy in England, “Daren would have been much further along in his development as batsman and captain.  All he needs is a shot without the stupid stuff that has been taking place.”
Last week, Dr Harry, a captain himself since his days in the Under-14 side at QRC, was back at it. “As for averages,” he noted, “his is not worse than the average of many of those currently playing. Only Gayle, (Shivnarine) Chanders (Chanderpaul), (Dwayne) Bravo and (Ramnaresh) Sarwan have better averages than he does.    We seem to forget that when Lloyd was made captain he was not a certainty on the team. But somebody (was it Forbes Burnham or Kerry Packer?) saw something in him and pushed for him to be appointed captain. That gave him the confidence he lacked previously and elevated his stature.”
 “It is what developed countries do better than us,” he ended.  “Look at how South Africa treated (Graeme) Smith and England Michael Vaughan. They saw the potential in a young player, anointed him and then appointed him. I think you will agree that in both cases the strategy proved a success.” 
Previewing the regional limited-overs competition in the TnT Times, columnist Fazeer Mohammed for his part had this to say about Ganga. “It will be difficult for the selectors to overlook Ganga’s credentials if he not only leads his side to a successful defence of the crown, but also enjoys a prolific series with the bat. This, of course, is the 30-year-old’s obvious shortcoming. For all of his tactical acumen, motivational skill and impressive role as team spokesman on the sub-continent, Ganga’s batting average of 24.71 from 48 Tests weighs heavily against him.”
Mohammed continues “(…) the Trinidadian skipper will find it much more difficult to get the best out of players from other territories, quite unlike what he has been able to accomplish over the past five years at the helm of the national side. When he had the responsibility of West Indies captaincy thrust upon him during the 2007 tour of England following Ramnaresh Sarwan’s injury, Ganga’s confidence and form nosedived and he subsequently revealed that, at a time when he needed the support of the technical staff and other senior members of the squad, none was forthcoming.”
Then there’s Peter Roebuck about whose motives and relationship to West Indies cricket we wrote in last month’s issue. “Those convinced that the only lasting solution to the West Indies’ cricketing problems is to break it up and let the islands play as individual nations found in Trinidad and Tobago’s thrilling display plenty to support their case.”
“In the shorter term,” he goes on, “Ganga’s captaincy has surely also put the cat among the pigeons. It was widely and justifiably praised. After all, it’s been a long time since any West Indian captain coaxed a performance as spirited from his side.” 
“Although Ganga’s batting might not be quite up to scratch (he’s hardly alone in that), the West Indian selectors ought to consider appointing him captain of their team to tour Australia. Apart from anything else, it’s unlikely that he’ll arrive three days before the First Test match, appear disinterested, and spend his time complaining about administrators and money and the rest of it.”
Tony Cozier also takes time to examine Ganga’s claims to the captaincy. One senses that the region’s most respected commentator on the game is not entirely enamoured of the idea. “Gayle has asserted that he is ready to resume his role,” Cozier writes in the Sunday Express of October 25, “stating that ‘it is always an honour to captain the West Indies.’ Ganga has sensibly made no mention of such ambitions.”
One does not have to be a language major to be struck by the choice of adverb in that last sentence. A paragraph on, Cozier is less equivocal.
“There can be no doubt,” he writes, “that he has special qualities of leadership. As astute a judge as Ian Chappell alluded to it in the television commentary. Given the responsibility at whatever level, he will hardly shirk from it.
“Yet Ganga will know that leading the West Indies is an entirely different challenge.”
He goes on to note that concerning Ganga’s claims, “there remains the perennial question of whether his batting merits selection,” citing his 25.71 Test average over the ten years since his debut as a promising 19-year-old in South Africa. There are no adverbs here but the effect is hardly different.
Easily the most important voice to be added to the choir singing the T&T captain’s praises is that of the President of the Trinidad and Tobago Cricket Board (TTCB). Deryck Murray last week told the world at a cricket gathering in Tunapuna that he felt that Bravo should be made vice-captain of the regional team, David Williams should be confirmed as team coach and Omar Khan be reinstated as Manager. Short on detail, the same report, written by the Express’ Roger Seepersad, reveals that Murray had “approached the West Indies Cricket Board to look at making (…) Ganga captain of the regional team.” Although there is no indication of precisely when the approach was made, Murray is quoted as saying that “we need astute leadership which I believe Ganga can give.” It is far from conclusive but the use of the present tense suggests that it is a relatively recent initiative, a conclusion reinforced by the comments Seepersad reports Murray as making later on in the piece.  
“And I have also suggested to the West Indies Cricket Board,” the former West Indies vice-captain continues, “to host a Twenty20 tournament and I believe that Trinidad and Tobago should host it later in December.” Murray expresses confidence that there will be no trouble in getting a sponsor for the tournament given “T&T’s recent success.” The timing is important because last month’s Twenty20 success appears to be weighing heavily in the scales. But, as Cozier points out in his October 25 Express piece, Twenty20 cricket is “paradoxically the kind of cricket that cost him (Ganga) the West Indies captaincy in the first place.” 
Trinidad and Tobago began the Champions League tournament as 22-1 outsiders and, had the early batsmen not been guilty of several serious errors of judgement, they might well have found themselves winners of the championship trophy and the US$2.5 million top prize. That alone should give pause. But there is more. Ganga’s side reached the final without losing a single match and three of the T&T players, Dwayne Bravo, Keiron Pollard and wicketkeeper Denesh Ramdin,  secured spots on the Champions League All-Star XI named at the end of the tournament. One might argue that there was great incentive for individuals to produce their best in this forum but that would be to ignore the fact of the team’s track record and clear growth over the last five or six years since Ganga has been in charge.
It is also worth noting that, with the possible exception of Bravo (Dwayne), it was different individuals stepping up at the right moment which gave the T&T unit the success they enjoyed in the tournament. Against Somerset it was Ramdin, against the Chargers and NSW Blues it was Pollard, and Adrian Barath, Navin Stewart, Sherwin Ganga, William Perkins, Dave Mohammed  and Ravi Rampaul all chipped in at crucial moments. The team leader, of course, gets the credit but Cozier provides another explanation: There is a certain positive chemistry which has built up over the long time this team has been together that works for the team. Ganga, he says, “knows his men intimately, and vice-versa. They play together at club level and (…) have a passion for each other and for their flag.”
Cozier talks about “the esteem in which (Gayle) is held by his players” but he does not quite say in words that what Ganga is to T&T, Gayle pretty much is to the West Indies. And with an Australia with a lot to prove next up in the schedule, one feels that the selectors are not going to look beyond the natural leader of the full West Indies team.
If they do—and perhaps even if they don’t— WI could be in for “a bit of a hiding” as Brian Lara so delicately put it last month.

Usain Bolt

To celebrate the Gleaner Honour Award for Excellence in the field of Science and Technology, Prof Helen Asemota wore a hairstyle which she named the “yam hairstyle”.
Above her forehead was what she called the corm. Rising out of the corm were twists of braided hair which she described as the vines and, at the bottom of the corm and the vines was the tuber, which was actually her face; and she was smiling.
“I am very happy, now more motivated. I feel there is now more to do because people are asking questions. I feel that there is a long road to travel and we have only just started,” she said after receiving her award.
Prof Asemota, who specialises in biochemistry, molecular biology and nanotechnology, hails from Nigeria and is currently professor of biochemistry and molecular biology in the Department of Medical Sciences at the University of the West Indies, Mona. She is also head of the Nanobiology Division at Shaw University in North Carolina and chair of the Shaw Institutional Research Board.
The professor has completed extensive research on yam and ways to improve the tuber with the use of biotechnology.
With the high exposure of yam on the international market through the successful exploits of Usain Bolt and his attribution of that success to the food, Asemota believes Jamaica has a lot to benefit from marketing yam.
“Jamaica can really run with yam. In fact, Jamaica should be in a position where, at the next Olympics, we have bombarded the market with yam products. The world is looking out for that.”
Asemota also wants to see the day when scientific research is used more in policy formation in the island. This, she says, can only benefit the island.
She has provided consultancy services to various international organisations, such as the European Union (EU) and the United Nations. In 1994, she was the technical expert in her field with the EU and, in 2001, she served as international technical cooperation programmes consultant for biotechnology to Syria. Asemota was also the international consultant for biotechnology to the Republic of Tajikistan from 2003 to 2007. In that position, she provided technical leadership for the Tajikistan National Seed Potato Production Programme. The work she did there went a long way towards making that country food sufficient.
—Courtesy the Jamaica Gleaner

A limited edition of 100 Cobo prints by artist Edward Bowen is now on offer at In2Art Gallery.  The prints are of images commissioned from Bowen by the Film Company of Trinidad and Tobago for the recent Trinidad and Tobago Film Festival. “Cobo” is on sale at TTD$2,500 while “Cobo Business” is available at TTD$1,000. The images can be viewed at in2artltd.com by selecting ‘Previous Exhibitions’ and ‘Artists’

ARTIST STATEMENT
By Edward Bowen

The first attempts to deal with this commission was an exercise in recall as I mentally went through a list of many possibilities associated with the idea of film, a film festival, the audiences and many other design brief factors which I felt would influence the design and a satisfactory result. None of these directions rang any bells so I went to phase two with the inspiration process and decided to relax my mind and eyes and allow a signal to come through.
There lives by me a family or group of corbeaux (cobo); as far as I can make out, they’ve been there for a few generations unperturbed by the various movements of my family and others. My recent arrival last year was of no business to them as they seemed to continue their routines without any noticeable alarm or care. In the mornings, every morning, good weather permitting, about 20 of them scattered on the lawn, some with their wings extended drying, some sitting, some just standing there. (It seems as if) This is a regular thing before they begin the day looking for carrion carcasses and endless flight exercises catching currents that come off the bay and cliff, sometimes the cobo goes flying for the sake of it, soaring upwards to thousands of feet, why I don’t know.

It was the eyes and head that caught my attention, the hyper sensitivity and trigger-like senses, ever ready; I could sense how they felt threatened by man who sees them as ugly, dirty and smelly. The observations continued for a few weeks and my fascination grew, in the proximity of neighbourly relations I found myself obsessed as much as being the observer.
Who became enigma, monochrome outcast, water, the winged janitor moving between dimensions of sky, sea and dirt, circling, waiting for life processes to end so they can go to work. Cobo was the anti-hero and the unexpected messenger nervous and insecure yet ultimately belonging and ever present, the feeling was to bring that identity forward and articulate a silent graceful conversation. Despite the nervous scratching and texturing of the image, cobo emerged glancing over her shoulder as if caught in a dance flight moment, relaxed, serene, noble and luminescent.
Cobo, ubiquitous overseer, peerer, like the cameraman unseen; more and more cobo became a lens, the embodiment and symbol of a continuous alternative view, the outsider, the artist, somewhat misunderstood on the periphery yet simultaneously dead center to our senses in place and time, transformer and witness.
In the New York studio, Master Printer Luther at Axelle Fine Arts in Brooklyn, separating layers of scratches and suggesting the final skin of iridescence ‘to bring the form forward’ and adding the extra subtle sheen and glistening of water and salt on oily black feathers.
The small print, Cobo Business, a bonus conversation in what would have been wasted space in the printing process, 3 cobos about to negotiate the spoils of 2 dead fish.