Jamaican Sugar Industry

18 May 2005

Diane Abbott, British MP of Jamaican descent and chair of the influential All Party Parliamentary Group of the British Caribbean MP’s came to the defence of the Jamaican sugar industry when launching a major Christian Aid report at the Foreign Press Association this week in London.

At the launch, Diane Abbott said, “Tony Blair is committed to reducing poverty in Africa. But he doesn’t seem to realise that the policies of free trade and liberalisation that he thinks are the answer to world poverty risk plunging countries like Jamaica into destitution. Sugar and bananas are Jamaica’s major agricultural exports. Since the end of empire Jamaica has enjoyed protected access to British markets. By ending this protection in the name of free trade and liberalisation Jamaica risks the collapse of these industries particularly sugar. The recent announcement of a cut in the price of sugar is a body blow to the Jamaican sugar industry. The consequence of the collapse of sugar will be a rise in unemployment and the continuing drift of the Jamaican rural poor to the big cities. Sadly, some of these people will drift into prostitution, drugs and other criminal activity.”

And she went on, “We in Britain cannot isolate ourselves from the social consequences of forcing poor countries into liberalisation because the problems will wash up on our doorsteps. Just as we have globalised trade flows and globalised capital flows, we have globalised crime flows. We must recognise this link. It is no good saying we are having a war on drugs, when Britain promotes trade policies which put Caribbean people out of work and risks them drifting into crime.”

Abbott praised the Christian Aid report for highlighting the seriousness of the free trade issue and for showing the real effects it has on poor countries. She concluded, “This report shows that free trade does not necessarily alleviate poverty, it can make poor people even worse off.”



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