Deprived of the Basics: Think Tank says legacies of slavery remain for the Jamaican poor
The World Bank (WB) in an update on poverty in Jamaica made in November 2024 states that food insecurity remains an issue, with around one-third of respondents to the Caribbean Food Security and Livelihoods Survey reporting that they went an entire day, out of the last 30 days, without eating in April 2024.
The BTI blames the lingering impact of a slave past. Among its reflections is the assertion that , “The historical legacies of slavery and plantations have led to an economy and society in which race, gender and class strongly influence access to economic and political power. These influences continue to be relevant during the review period.”
The World Bank also said that the quality of new jobs is concerning. The WB stated, “The share of Jamaicans living below the upper-middle income international poverty line of 6.85 USD per day is estimated to have dropped from 13.9 percent in 2021 to 12.3 percent in 2023.
“This likely reflects continued employment growth, as poverty and unemployment have moved in tandem throughout the last two decades. The unemployment rate stood at 5.4 percent in the first quarter of 2024. Yet job quality remains a concern: around half of non-agricultural jobs are informal.”
The World Bank remarked as well that Jamaica has been among the slowest growing economies in the Latin America and Caribbean region with “persistently low productivity growth due to a weak business environment, limited innovation, and human capital constraints.
“The economy has limited diversification, with a concentration on low-productivity services, geared towards tourism. High connectivity costs, inadequate digital infrastructure, and pervasive crime hamper private investment, while ongoing fiscal consolidation and relatively high debt service costs constrain public capital investment,” it was noted.
BTI asserts that low levels of trust in politicians, “in large part due to corrupt practices and the connections between political and business interests,” hinders the effectiveness with which state resources can be utilized for the delivery of high-quality health care and education in both rural and urban regions.”
Corruption, it was noted, along with high unemployment rates and the prevalence of violent crimes like homicides are among the most urgent issues facing Jamaica.
The group admits that important structural changes have taken place in the telecommunications, financial services, tourism and agricultural sectors, plus “significant growth in the informal economy and the business processing outsourcing (BPO) sector.”
But BTI, in its analysis claims equal distribution of resources or governance remains hindered by inefficiencies and weaknesses in “creating a more inclusive, democratic form of governance.”
The analysts pointed to that extreme political views makes it hard to “sustain participatory government initiatives that give meaningful space and voice to the legitimate concerns of marginalized social groups, regardless of party affiliation.”
The Multidimensional Poverty Index (MPI) indicates that the most recent survey data estimates for Jamaica are that that 2.8 percent of the population (78 thousand people in 2021) is multidimensionally poor while an additional 5.0 percent is classified as vulnerable to multidimensional poverty (141 thousand people in 2021).
The intensity of deprivations in Jamaica, which is the average deprivation score among people living in multidimensional poverty, is 38.9 percent, MPI indicates, giving estimates based on data reviewed.
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