United States - Dominica - Island Life Unscripted!

22 May 2009

Floating To Cuba!

Written by Chris in Ramblings No Comments →

oliphant

Close your eyes - Think imaginatively about USA President Obama lifting restrictions on family travel and remittances to Cuba from relatives living in the USA.

Think of the long, long term and a most extraordinary scene may unfold in your mind’s eye — rafts of refugees floating TO Cuba!

It has been clear to many people that for a long time the USA’s economic restrictions against Cuba have been largely symbolic. It is true that they serve to remind the world that the USA rejects the Castro regime and the communist ideology behind it.

But it is equally true that these restrictions have only hurt the ordinary Cuban people without bringing any meaningful change in the island’s leadership or system of government.

Surely, the quality of life for people in ‘embargo-free’ Cuba would get progressively better as Castro’s communist dream unfolds. When the good life in Cuba becomes a powerful magnet, guess what some of the poor and disillusioned people suffering under the terrible capitalist system would do? Build their barges, check the tides, set hopeful eyes on Cuba and start to float. It’s enough to make you blink.

Source:www.chronicledominica.com

Tagged with: Barack Obama, Caribbean, Cuba, Embargo, Fidel Castro, Sanctions, United States

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Dominica Events:

Dive Fest 2009

Dive Fest 2009 runs from July 10-19 2009 and this will be the 16th consecutive year that the Dominica Watersports Association has presented this annual event. Dive Fest is the longest running Scuba Diving Festival in the Caribbean, and what better island to host such an event than Dominica. SCUBA DIVING Magazine′s Reader′s Choice Awards for Top Macro Life, Dive Destination, Healthy Environment and Underwater Photography among other categories.

View the complete list of Dive Fest 2009 Events »

World Creole Music Festival 2009 (WCMF)

Every year the World Creole Music Festival in Dominica brings together musicians, singers and bands from all over the world. The festival beginnings evey year on "international Creole Day" � the last Friday in October with unique rhythms of Zouk, Cadence, Compas, Soukous and Bouyon Music. In 2009, the World Creole Music Festival expected to be bigger than ever.

Visit the World Creole Music Festival for update on the WCMF 2009 »

20 May 2009

Unemployment Crisis?

Written by Chris in Ramblings No Comments →

unemployment

Some viewers in Dominica of nightly CNN newscast may have been surprised at detailed and shocking reports of monthly job losses in the United States because of the current financial crisis.

But in spite of all the job losses many of our most productive and enterprise workers continue emigrating to the US in search of green pastures – hence increasing the steady flow of brain drain out of the Dominican economy.

Maybe they can also recall not long ago the labour party government was unable, or unwilling, to give the opposition a straight answer about the current unemployment rate in Dominica.

It’s amusing, we’re being bombarded with information for the United States about weekly job losses but we cannot complete an employment survey that we started almost six years ago. I cannot help to think that the unemployment figures are so unflattering that the government wants the nation on-a-whole to forget that it exits. Are the figures of employment so terrible?

It’s also discouraging, that the government is a shame to give the public a true picture of the rate of employment and the present economic situation. If our policy makers do not acknowledge that there is a problem – then they will seek no solutions.

In the final analysis, if we as small island nation fail to manage this crisis with rational responses then as the popular old staying goes “Crapaud Smoke Our Pipe”.

Tagged with: Brain Drain, Dominica, Economy of the United States, Employment, Global financial crisis of 2008–2009, Labour, Unemployment, United States

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19 May 2009

Brain Down the Drain

Written by Chris in Education 2 Comments →

brain-drain

If education is the key to development in any knowledge-based economy, then why is Dominica losing so much of its human capital? Maybe the choices are so few.

Dominicans are becoming aware of the large flow of our brains down the drain especially during the annual graduation season of students from Dominica’s Secondary schools and the Dominica State College.

Every year during graduation students are given well-meaning advice on the value of an education and the need to build on whatever they have learnt as they continue the journey of life.

But few of these so-called advisers address the fact that only a small percentage of the graduating students every year will enter the job market; a large number will join the unemployed on the street corner and dozen more will go overseas in search of so-called greener pastures.

Statistics shows that the out-ward flow of the country’s best brains has been so steady over the years that it appears that Dominica’s education system has been commissioned to train persons for the job market of the United States, Canada, Antigua, Guadeloupe, St Martin, Tortola, and other countries in the region. The problem is that these emigrants have been educated to secondary and tertiary level in Dominica and are Dominica’s most productive and enterprising workers particularly at their age.

When are we going to realize that knowledge is a wealth-creating asset to our country’s development? I’m literally pleading with government leaders, to please come up with some incentives that will encourage more of educated brains to stay and help develop our small island economy. Not someone else economy.