A Caribbean crime wave

Caribbean islands have long been associated with idyllic beaches and sunny tourist resorts. But increasingly, some countries, particularly in the English-speaking Caribbean, are earning a reputation for their sharply rising rates of crime.

Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago are among the worst affected. Beyond the toll on society, crime and violence carry high economic costs, including an adverse impact on foreign investment and tourism.

At an average of 30 homicides per 100,000 inhabitants per year, the English-speaking Caribbean now has one of the highest murder rates in the world. Incidents of assaults, burglary, kidnapping and rape are also above the world average, and rising.

Jamaica's murder rate has stayed over 35 per 100,000 for the past ten years, making it a world leader in homicides. After spiking at 63.2/100,000 in 2005, Jamaica's murder rate fell slightly to 59.2/100,000 in 2007, although it remained well above that of Colombia (36.2/100,000), a country in the grips of a 40-year civil war.

The high incidence of crime in Trinidad and Tobago is a relatively new phenomenon: the murder rate rose from just 7.4/100,000 in 1999 to a historical high of 30.6/100,000 in 2007.

The security situation in smaller Caribbean countries has also deteriorated. A crackdown in Jamaica has driven drug-trafficking and related crime to other parts of the Caribbean, particularly the small island nations that make up the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS, which consists of Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, Montserrat, St Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, and St Vincent and the Grenadines).

In the OECS the average murder rate rose sharply from 15.7/100,000 in 2004 to 19.9/100,000 in 2007, despite relatively strong economic growth and falling unemployment.

The main force driving the high rates of crime and violence in the Caribbean is the impact of intra-regional drug trafficking. The explosion of the international drug trade has institutionalised criminal behaviour, increased property-related crime by drug users and underpinned a steady increase in the availability of firearms.

Geographically, the region is vulnerable because of its location at a crossroads between steady streams of illegal narcotics flowing north from the world's main source of cocaine (”the Andean region”) to the drugs' main consumer markets, (the US and Europe) and guns flowing south mainly from the US to South America.

Adding to the challenge, Caribbean countries have expansive coastlines and vast territorial waters to patrol and lack adequate law enforcement. The result is huge flows of drugs through the region. Drug proceeds are often used to buy illegal arms and put sophisticated arsenals in the hands of competing gangs, in turn fuelling the murder rate and driving a wave of kidnappings and extortion.

According to a report by the UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), around 216 tonnes of cocaine pass through the Caribbean and the Guianas (Guyana, Suriname and French Guiana) every year en route to the US and Europe, accounting for one-half of the US's cocaine imports and one-half of Europe's. This figure is set to rise further as recent crackdowns on Central American drug-smuggling routes have begun to shift more supply to the Caribbean basin.

The economic importance of the drug trade was estimated by the UNODC as equivalent to around 3.5% of formal-sector GDP in the region overall, and to 7.5% of GDP in Jamaica. Marijuana production and exports are less important regionally, but are locally significant in both Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago.

In both Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago, the state has played an integral role in combating crime, but it is also responsible for creating the conditions for it to proliferate.

In the 1970s the two main political parties in Jamaica helped to organise and arm residents in urban slums, producing 'garrison communities', where gangs controlled the streets at the behest of politicians and marshalled voters at election time.

By the early 1980s, as demand for illegal drugs began to soar in the US, Jamaica developed into a transshipment point, and many gangs became involved in cocaine and marijuana smuggling. With money of their own, they no longer needed the patronage of politicians and began to operate independently.

The sharp upward trend in the murder rate in Trinidad and Tobago also has been propelled by the flow of narcotics and guns. Six neighbourhoods surrounding the capital, Port of Spain, account for over one-half of all murders. Gang warfare is estimated to have claimed 53% of all murder victims in 2003-07.

The roots of today's culture of lawlessness in Trinidad and Tobago are openly debated; some believe that they can be attributed to a loss of respect for the state and the rule of law.

This has been compounded by a series of high-level corruption scandals and a sense that, in a country with plenty of resources, the delivery of state-run services has failed to live up to expectations. Coupled with the large percentage of the population that has been excluded from Trinidad and Tobago's recent economic boom, this has fuelled the emergence of a gang culture.

Violence in the Caribbean is aggravated by a steady inflow of criminal deportees, many of whom have adopted criminal behaviour in major cities such as London and New York. An estimated 30,000 deportees were sent to Jamaica, Trinidad and Tobago and Guyana between 1990 and 2005.

Crime brings with it substantial economic costs. A report by the UNODC and the World Bank found that crime in the English-speaking Caribbean drives away investment, both foreign and domestic, and consequently slows growth. Because of the need to employ additional security measures, crime increases the costs of doing business, diverting investment away from business expansion and productivity improvement.

It leads to losses through theft, looting, arson, fraud and extortion. Other non-material losses include the immeasurable cost of employee morale, productivity and safety.

The report estimates that if Caribbean countries were able to reduce crime levels to those similar to Costa Rica (with a homicide rate of 8.1/100,000), their rates of economic growth would increase notably. In the cases of Jamaica and Haiti, GDP growth would be boosted by a massive 5.4% annually; growth in the Dominican Republic would be 1.8 percentage points higher, and Guyana's economy would grow by an additional 1.7 points per year.

Although no estimate was made for Trinidad and Tobago, it is fair to assume that there would be a sizeable economic benefit to be derived from a reduction in crime.

Further, in a 2006 World Bank survey, 39% of business managers in the Caribbean said that they were less likely to expand their business because of crime, while 37% responded that crime had discouraged investments that would have improved their businesses productivity.

The study estimated that security costs for private companies in Jamaica amount to an average of 2% of revenue (higher for small companies and lower for the largest firms). Additional security costs include the installation of fencing, grilles and alarm systems, and the hiring of additional private (and frequently armed) security staff.

Businesses also have to take into account potential losses from reduced working hours, as many businesses in Kingston close before dark.

High crime rates also carry indirect costs. Rising insecurity is driving educated workers to leave their home countries at an alarming rate. According to the World Bank, the seven countries with the highest emigration rates for college graduates in the world are in the Caribbean.

Foreign direct investment to the region has trended steadily upwards in the past decade, but the bulk has gone to natural-resource sectors, where decisions are less influenced by crime rates. However, the performance of the tourism industry, which relies heavily on domestic and foreign investment, is highly sensitive to rising crime (whether real or perceived).

The tourism industry is Jamaica's largest employer and is of vital importance to the economy, accounting for around 10% of GDP. It is also Jamaica's second-largest source of foreign exchange (after workers' remittances), earning a record US$1.9bn in 2006.In Trinidad and Tobago, tourism (mainly on the island of Tobago) accounts directly for around 6% of GDP and employs around 6% of the workforce.

While most violent crime in Trinidad and Tobago is concentrated in the ghettos surrounding Port of Spain, violent attacks on visitors to Tobago have risen sharply in recent years. Direct attacks on tourists, whether in Tobago or Jamaica, have a marked impact on the tourism sector, given the importance of positive consumer perception.

More than any other economic activity, the success or failure of a tourism destination depends on being able to provide a safe and secure environment for visitors.

Rising violence has led to a construction boom of 'all-inclusive' hotels in both countries, which aim primarily to provide a full-service holiday experience, but also to reassure tourists that they will be safe. The economic impact of this phenomenon is significant. It is widely accepted that all-inclusive hotels do not foster important backward linkages to the rest of the local economy, thereby reducing the overall economic benefit of tourism.

The governments of Trinidad and Tobago and Jamaica are working to improve their respective security environments, for both political and economic reasons. However, the approach in both countries has been unevenly split between law enforcement and preventative measures, with the majority of government programmes falling into the former category.

Because the major threat is perceived to emanate from the activities of foreign drug-trafficking networks operating inside the two countries, the focus has been on strengthening intra-regional and international co-operation.

The Caribbean Community (Caricom, of which Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago are members) has undertaken several steps to deal with security issues. In 1983, a regional security system was established in the eastern Caribbean, covering Barbados and the six independent members of the OECS.

The Caricom Regional Task Force on Crime and Security (RTFCS), established in 2001, drew attention to the linkages within the region between drug trafficking and crime, and their overall impact on national and regional security. It encouraged the formulation of national crime control master plans and national crime commissions.

On an international level, military training agreements exist with the US and the UK. The defence forces of several Caricom countries (including Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago) have received financial and technical assistance from the US.

But the effectiveness of domestic and internationally assisted security programmes is hampered by deficiencies in the criminal justice systems in both countries.

Estimated to be less than 1%, the conviction rate for murders in Trinidad and Tobago is very low. Both the Director of Public Prosecutions and the country's chief magistrate admitted in 2007 that witness intimidation was having a severe negative impact on criminal justice proceedings.

The Law Association of Trinidad and Tobago has described the current state of the criminal justice system as being 'in virtual collapse'.

The response from the government has been for the prime minister, Patrick Manning, to call for the reinstatement of the death penalty, a move that has been condemned by international human rights organisations such as Amnesty International.

Until the weak criminal justice systems are reformed, the impact of law enforcement initiatives will continue to be constrained. Further, without broader successes in combating drug trafficking and stemming consumer demand coming from the US and Europe, the drivers of much of the crime in the Caribbean will remain in place, and the economic costs to these countries will mount.

The vicious circle of poverty, social exclusion and a lack of formal-sector opportunity that fuels gang membership also need to be addressed if the deterioration in security is to be reversed.

(Extracted from the March 24, 2008 edition of the ETA/Hogg Robinson Group “Travel News”)