What Caribbean Economies Must Learn from the European Crisis

Caribbean nations must widen their contact base, build new relationships, and nurture friendships with unfamiliar nations in good times because after the recession England, the US (and all the large nations we used to depend on) will have to focus on themselves.

There are lessons! | Photo by Enokson

That paragraph is a pretty crude summary of a Stabroek editorial Global economic difficulties and ourselves. Read the full thing, as they highlight how countries like Brazil are carving out new markets for themselves and what we can learn about how we ought to adjust. Here is a critical paragraph.

As many European countries, each having a vote in the councils of the EU, and feeling as disadvantaged as some developing country, now seek to find ways out of their current economic imbroglios, there will be little time or inclination to appreciate the slogans of “small and vulnerable” and “special and differential treatment.” Their future, post-recession, relationship with us will depend on the lines of interaction that we lay today, and the extent of the familiarity that they have with us in better times. We can no longer simply depend on the ‘great powers‘ of Europe to facilitate their access to us, or our access to their investments, resources or diplomatic empathy in difficult times.

Very true.