The East Caribbean Dollar is stabilized and maintained by the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank (ECCB), governed by Sir Kenneth Dwight Vincent Venner, KBE SLC since 1989. In 1965, the EC dollar replaced the British West Indies dollar, which had been in circulation for thirty years.
Since neither the pound sterling nor the Euro is representative money, I presume the East Caribbean dollar is not either. It is, as far as I know, fiat money, meaning it is not backed by any precious metal but has its intrinsic value determined by government decree. In fact, the only currency in use that is significantly valued by gold is the Lebanese Pound, at present backing about 50% of the country's in-circulation currency.
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| Lebanese piastres. |
Things being as they are presently, however, we wordlessly submit to the superiority of the US dollar. Yet, before we can analyze the fate of the money in our nation's hands, you may want to briefly look at what America is doing with its own.
In Dominica, we do not have white overseers around the corner to bomb us, set fire to our houses, or lynch us. What we DO have is a government-to-population relationship that is a breeding ground for corruption and inefficiency. And the results can be equally as devastating. I say again, our oppression is not rooted in race...but in politics. Until we address it, the divide between the rich and the poor will continue to expand at both ends until, perhaps, the greenery reclaims our island as it becomes civilly inhabitable.
The key to maintaining power over an oppressed people is depressingly simple: do not let them control their own money. The man who has his own money and uses it wisely seeks no validation from another, he fears no imprisonment, he cannot be easily enslaved, and he prospers without comparing himself to others. And some persons in high positions have exploited these facts.
According to the United Nations Development Programme, 40% of Dominica's general population lived in poverty as of 2003. This number dropped to 23% in 2009, says another source, but our population has stagnated (70, 058 to 70,996) during the same period of time. For more economic statistics, click here.
Meanwhile, the 2007 Caribbean Development Bank Annual Economic Report (CDB AER) highlighted agriculture as Dominica's most productive sector by far, more than tripling the gains from tourism. (page 148) Agricultural activity contributed to 34% of total domestic exports in 2004 and and averaged 9.24% of our GDP between 1994 and 2003 (an average of EC $601.37 million per year from 2000 to 2004, DAAS, see pp. 14-15), says the CARICOM Secretariat. (page 6) For more GDP stats, click here. However, agriculture has experienced a steady decline since the late 1970s (presumably due to Hurricane David) and has only risen to 17.7% in 2013.
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| Agriculture - value added (% of GDP) in Dominica |
Tourism has been inconsistent in its recent contributions to national productivity, with negative growth in stay-over arrivals for almost half of the years between 2007 and 2013. (2013 CDB AER page 19) It contributed less than 28% of the labour force as of 2002, wavering between 19.4% and -7.40% real growth from 2005 to 2015 (see below or click here to choose country, variable, and measure). However, in 2013, it supplied EC $536 million to the GDP (38.7% of total GDP) and 9,700 jobs (13.5% of total population), says the World Travel & Tourism Council. And tourism has been on the rise in the past three years.
Now, let's take those two sets of data and compare them to the places where the government has been pumping its investments.
Our best friend China (who has a lot of other best friends) has 'given' us exorbitant gifts: $18 billion in 2013 for "community based projects and the construction of the new Princess Margaret Hospital" (DNO), $70 million for a Roseau hotel that same year (MercoPress), a "$100 million West Coast Road Rehabilitation Project" in 2010/2011, ironically signed by Hon. Rayburn Blackmoore - take that, Salisbury- (DNO), financial assistance with two phases of the Dominica Grammar School reconstruction, $33 million for the Windsor Park Stadium in 2005 (Wikipedia), and a Friendship Bridge to consummate our love for and commitment to the one-China policy. ["Beijing responded to Dominica's severing relations with the Republic of China [Taiwan] by giving them a $12 million aid package, which includes $6 million in budget support for the year 2004 and $1 million annually for six years." (Wikipedia) I wonder how our just-a-friend friend, the European Union, feels about all this.]
This feels like we are blindly shadowing the actions of the United States, who is $1.2 trillion in debt to China alone (but somehow manages to give China foreign aid to the order of tens of millions of dollars), as of March 2015. Political games are being played at the risk of our frail economy, but Dominicans seem more interested in being devout Labourites than devout labourers. The self-hate is palpable. (And is that Venezuelan giggling I hear from the back of the room? Ca-caw!)
Many have noted and criticized the Prime Minister's reluctance to divulge the details of the memoranda of understanding concerning these projects, but Hon. Skerrit has, for the most part, maintained that secrecy. Meanwhile, the Economic Citizenship Program (AKA buy one passport, get a second one half-off), the Bin-Gate scandal, and the Blaircourt Villas issues have put his own integrity in the spotlight. The cost of election campaigning has also skyrocketed in recent years, likening us yet again to the United States, where politicians are sponsored by corporations that could later influence government policies. A $27 million presidential state palace has been built with little public resistance to this gift from Shanghai, but pipe-borne water remains a luxury for some Dominicans (this fact made even more shameful in light of our 365 rivers).
Now ask yourself: how many of those projects have a direct, significant impact on our two most productive industries of tourism and agriculture? How profitable could it be to have such lavish resorts for a population under 80, 000 (most of whom cannot afford such accommodations anyway) and cruise arrival statistics that leave much to be desired? How much respectable priority has been given thus far to Salisbury farmers, seeing that agriculture dominates Dominica's labour force? Or, for that matter, to the members of the Public Works Corporation (PWC) and the Dominica Public Service Union (DPSU)? For all our infrastructural improvements, has the cost of living gone down? Have salaries been significantly raised? Has VAT, by some miracle of mathematics discernible only by idiots, lowered the cost of goods?
And ask yourself again: just how much of our nation's assets are tied up in China's hands? If they go to war, will we have to respond accordingly? Do these secret MOUs include forking over actual land? Is there anything preventing our Chinese population from overwhelming the locals demographically (since they already surpass us financially)? And will we continue to feed into their cheaper product market while they funnel the profits back to Asia?
Above all, are we creating a Yellow Wall Street in our own front yard, allowing our East Caribbean Dollar not to circulate on island but to flow uni-directionally OUT of our country's pockets in exchange for bigger buildings and slicker roads?
You tell me.
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