Towards sustainable development in SIDS

Dillon Alleyne PhD Deputy Director, ECLAC Subregional Headquarters for the Caribbean

Port of , , 17 May 2019 CARIBBEAN FIRST!

• Strategic focus on persistent Caribbean development challenges including disaster assessment; • Raising levels of national and regional advocacy in the search for solutions; • Giving prominence to discourse on critical Caribbean issues in all ECLAC forums; • Leveraging financial support and technical assistance for agreed Caribbean priorities; • Promoting wider Caribbean engagement in ECLAC forums and initiatives.

Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 2 Environmental Vulnerability: Need for a global, regional and subregional compact for addressing Climate Change impact

Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 Countries Impacted by Storms

Number of disasters caused by storms and number of affected countries

16

14

12

10

8

6

4

2

0 1970 1973 1974 1978 1979 1980 1983 1984 1985 1986 1987 1988 1989 1990 1992 1993 1994 1995 1996 1998 1999 2000 2001 2002 2003 2004 2005 2007 2008 2010 2011 2012 2015 2016 2017 Number of affected countries Number of events

Source: EM-DAT: The CRED/OFDA International Disaster Database – www.emdat.be – Université Catholique de Louvain – Brussels – Belgium.

Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 4 Damage caused by storms

The Caribbean (29 countries and territories):a damage caused by storms, 1973- 2017 (Billions of dollars) 100,000,000

90,000,000

80,000,000

70,000,000

60,000,000

50,000,000

40,000,000

30,000,000

20,000,000

10,000,000

0 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015

Source: Economic Commission for and the Caribbean (ECLAC), on the basis of Centre for Research on the Epidemiology of Disasters (CRED), Emergency Events Database (EM-DAT) [online] www.emdat.be, and assessments by ECLAC and the World Bank. aAnguilla, , , Bahamas, , , British Virgin , , , , , , , Guyana, , , , , former , , and , Saint Martin, , Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, , Trinidad and Tobago, , Virgin Islands. Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 5 Indebtedness and Vulnerability

Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 6 Domestic macroeconomic vulnerability: facing debt overhang, fiscal constraints and low growth

Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 Weak economic growth

The Caribbean (15 countries): Average GDP growth rate (percentage)

2.5 2.0 1.5 1.0 0.5 0.0 -0.5 -1.0 -1.5 -2.0 -2.5 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018

Source: Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), on the basis of official figures. aAnguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, Montserrat, , Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago. Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 8 Declining exports

The World and selected groupings: merchandise exports, 2005-2015 (Average annual growth rates)

Source: United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD), UNCTADstat [online database] unctadstat.unctad.org. Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 9 High debt burden

The Caribbean (15 countries): average total public debt for goods and service producers (Per cent of GDP) 90.0 80.0 70.0 60.0 50.0 40.0 30.0 20.0 10.0 0.0 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 2017 2018

Goods Producers Service Producers

Source: Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), on the basis of official figures. a , Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, Montserrat, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago.

Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 10 External challenges affecting the Caribbean

Blacklisting: Caribbean countries black Reduction in and grey listed Weakening of global growth Declining ODA Declining FDI by EU for De-risking multilateralism expectations failure to meet OECD tax compliance standards

Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 11 Declining overseas development assistance

The Caribbean (13 countries): net official development assistance received, 1960–2016 (Percentages of gross national income)

Source: World Bank database. a Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname and Trinidad and Tobago Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 12 Falling foreign direct investments

The Caribbean (15 countries):a foreign direct investment inflows (Percentages of GDP)

12

10

8

6

4

2

0 2012 2013 2014 2015 2016 Goods producers Service producers

Source: Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), on the basis of official figures a Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Jamaica, Montserrat, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Trinidad and Tobago. Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 13 De-risking

- Loss of correspondent banking - Reduced remittance flows - Increased cost of money transfers - Disruption of trade flows - Negative effect on economic performance

Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 14 Social vulnerability: a new social compact for Caribbean SIDS

Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 Social Challenges

Advancing Investing for Low social Addressing Addressing women’s quality in High levels of protection NCDs and Poverty and empowerment human capital unemployment and access to inequality and their • Resources quality and migration ageing autonomy • Delinquency of skilled education for persons of the persons with population disabilities

Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 16 Poverty and Unemployment

The Caribbean population below national poverty line, unemployment rate and youth unemployment (Percentages)

Source: United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Caribbean Human Development Report: Multidimensional progress: Human resilience beyond income, New York, 2016 and World Bank, “World Development Indicators” [online database] databank.worldbank.org/data/databases.aspx.

Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 17 Non-Communicable Diseases

The Caribbean (15 countries and territories): deaths due to non-communicable diseases (NCDs) and population aged 60 and over, around 2010 (Percentages of all deaths) 90 MTQ JAM 85 ABW PRI GRD LCA ATG 80 VIR VCT BRB GLP 75 TTO

70 GUY BHS SUR 65 Deaths due to NCDs 60 BLZ

55 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22

Population aged 60 and over

Source: F. Jones, “Ageing in the Caribbean and the human rights of older persons: twin imperatives for action”, Studies and Perspectives series-ECLAC Subregional Headquarters for the Caribbean, No. 45 (LC/L.4130; LC/CAR/L.481), Santiago, Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), 2016.

Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 18 The way forward: collective actions

Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 Grasping opportunities

Improve access to finance; Promote Strengthen Create the private Address Regional Sustainable environment sector; build challenges Integration investment resilience youth skills to de- for value in the blue and through risking, chains economy promote mitigation Offshore development and creative women in and services , adaptation concession industries SMEs financing

Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 20 Partnerships for Key cross-cutting issues

New partnership for Address debt reduction Public-Private International through the ECLAC debt for climate adaptation Partnerships Cooperation swap initiative

New Social Compact: renewed collaboration South-South and Promote Strengthen regional between State- Triangular international integration Private sector- Cooperation advocacy and Civil society solidarity on SIDS issues Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019 21 Thank you!

Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, 17 May 2019