Contemporary Challenges for Caribbean Economies

The COVID-19 pandemic laid bare economic weaknesses throughout the Caribbean region, and humane standards of living are at risk. This book highlights the retooling that must be done to promote economic stability in this important area of the world. It contributes to ongoing discourse regarding Caribbean economies and highlights the long-term economic challenges that must be addressed to move forward.

In this book, economists Terence M. Yhip and Brian Alagheband offer ideas and proposals to reinvigorate economic growth through the adoption of technology and investment in human capital. The book explains how to diversify economies by increasing the complexity of exports. With a shift in priorities, nations will need to raise total factor productivity and potential output.

The book offers strategies to diversify the production and export of complex goods and services. The authors note that the necessary capabilities can take nations decades to build. Such investment will require trade-offs and sacrifice. Progress cannot and will not be immediate, but such modifications will produce meaningful economic returns.

Contemporary Challenges for Caribbean Economies includes a chapter on the oil future for Guyana, a rising economic "superstar" due to the nation's oil riches that portend either blessing or curse. It also includes a chapter written by Tawfik Ramtoolah about the impressive dynamism of the Mauritius economy, which transformed from sugar-cane monoculture to industrial and financial services diversification.

Terence M. Yhip is an economic consultant. He was previously a commercial banker and Visiting Fellow in the Department of Economics at the University of the West Indies in Mona, Jamaica. He holds a Ph.D. in economics from McGill University. Alongside Alagheband, Yhip is the coauthor of The Practice of Lending.

Brian Alagheband is an economic policy consultant at Hydro One in Ontario, Canada. He holds a M.A. in Economics from York University.