Focus on opportunities

BRIDGETOWN, Barbados - Should we congratulate St. Kitts and Nevis for being the most recent Caribbean nation to become a “high-income country, as defined by the World Bank? Recently, the President of the United States of America Barack Obama pointed out that it was his intention to terminate the designation of the twin-state as a beneficiary developing country under the Generalised System of Preferences (GSP) programme in accordance with the provisions of the 1974 Trade Act. He remarked that his reasons for doing so was that the country had become a high-income country and accordingly, its “eligibility for trade benefits under the GSP programme will end on January 1, 2014”. The move, which sees St. Kitts now joining a list of high-income nations as at July 2012 – including Barbados, Cayman Islands, Saint Martin, Sint Maarteen, Trinidad and Tobago, US Virgin Islands and the Bahamas – has provoked panic among some citizens who see it as a ploy for America to stop or reduce what they perceive to be badly needed aid.