THE EDITOR, Sir:
JAMAICA HAS been an exporter of raw materials since the days of the Spanish, latterly the English, and subsequently the Americans. All have treated Jamaica as a reservoir of raw materials. The British were especially pointed that the development of industry in the colonies was to be discouraged and forbidden, so that even the sugar produced here would be refined in England to facilitate the employment of the English and the development of British Industry.
Lard and leather, taken from the pigs and cattle from what is now Montego Bay (Spanish - Bahia Manteca - Lard Bay) was processed overseas, as was the glue from the pigs feet, the dye from the logwood. Shoes and dyes were too good to be made in Jamaica.
Latterly the Americans have processed the bauxite in their own country, with only a secondary twist into alumina, allegedly in the absence of adequate energy supplies.
One is hard-pressed not to read conspiracy in all of this unwillingness to make Jamaica and other Third World countries into industrial producers (Zambian copper comes readily to mind).
The gall has now acquired a double dose of bitterness in light of an Australian's intentions to export Jamaica's small quantity of scrap metal as raw material. One would have thought that anybody with ten million American dollars to invest would seek to convert the scrap metal into something useable in Jamaica. There is no doubt in my mind that Australia has millions of tons of scrap metal waiting to be exported. Why doesn't Mr. Australia export Australian scrap to the USA, since he has such a desire to export scrap. A few thousand tons of scrap will not bring enough revenue to Jamaica to feed the nation for a week - the income is mere food-money.
We in this country are tired of the domestic and international food-money syndrome. It is unfortunate that those who have useful ideas for the use of scrap metal have no money and those who have money can only think of removing it as raw material.
Damn the idea. Leave the scrap where it is. We will find a useful purpose for it in time. This is an industry waiting for 'value added'. May I appeal to the Government not to allow the export of scrap? We will rue the day wholesale scrap export is allowed. Our unemployed are waiting for someone to put them to work, not as hewers of wood and drawers of water - but manufacturers in our own right.
Will those with money stop treating us as bagatelle and begin serious investment in our people - in spite of the Government with which we are saddled. More meaningful days will come. Giving away scrap today may leave us even more exposed in the future. It is only scrap, but those exporting it know its value, so should we.
Let us not fritter away this source of wealth. We need it now; we will need it even more in the future.
I am, etc.,
CLIVE OCNACUWENGA
gingerground@hotmail.com
Box 83 Gregory Park P.O.
St. Catherine
