From Jamaica, a favorable discussion about ALBA and its role in the region. Venezuela is pressing for broader ties not only with Latin America but with Africa as well. It's all a positive part of a generalized process of international recomposition.



Caribbean development: Finding our own way
published: Sunday | September 4, 2005
Robert Buddan, Contributor

http://www.jamaica-gleaner.com/gleaner/20050904/focus/focus3.html

THE IMPACT of Hurricane Katrina on the oil-producing states of the
U.S. Gulf Coast caused oil prices to rise to US$70 per barrel last
week. Venezuela does not believe that oil prices will go below US$60
per barrel in the near future. How then do countries of the Caribbean
survive competitively when neither the Free Trade Area of the
Americas (FTAA), the International Monetary Fund (IMF) nor the World
Bank promises or provides any concessionary oil facility for crises
such as these?

The only certain buffer to the Caribbean is the Venezuelan
Alternative Bolivariana par alas Americas (ALBA-Bolivarian
Alternative of the Americas). CARICOM's decision to recognise the
legacy of Simon Bolivar on September 6 shows realism about taking
advantage of the benefits of ALBA and its centrepiece, the
PetroCaribe initiative, despite U.S. opposition to both.

CARICOM has to make use of these opportunities when they come along.
The ALBA initiative has come at the right time and from the right
country. It has come when oil prices are historically high and when
Venezuela, the world's fifth largest oil exporter and the only
country in the world willing to share its oil bonanza, offers to help
economically vulnerable neighbours. It has come when regional
integration is in favour throughout the Americas, but when Latin
America and the Caribbean need a noble alternative to the contentious
FTAA, proposed on U.S. terms. It has come at a time when the United
States is the world's only superpower and when countries in the
Americas believe that there should be counter powers able to check
and balance that power. Latin America has formed the South American
Community of Nations to do so.

BOLIVAR'S LEGACY

ALBA and the South American Community of Nations, both formed in
2004, are expressions of Simon Bolivar's dream for Pan-American
unity. Simon Bolivar Day is celebrated in Venezuela and Ecuador on
July 24. The 14 CARICOM countries that have signed the PetroCaribe
Agreement will acknowledge the value of this legacy on September 6.

Thanks to Bolivar, the Americas can claim the longest experience with
regionalism. Bolivar first proposed the idea of uniting the nations
of the Americas at the Pan- American Congress of1826. The
Organisation of American States (OAS) evolved from this idea. George
Bush himself acknowledged the importance of the Pan-American idea in
2001 by declaring April 8 Pan-American Day. Bush, however, had the
FTAA in mind as the vehicle through which to promote Pan-Americanism.
ALBA has emerged as the better alternative.

A number of countries have already entered into separate regional
schemes of their own. But ALBA seeks to accelerate and complement
these schemes. Under ALBA, a large number of agreements have been
signed between Venezuela and other Latin American countries.

ALBA AND WESTERN MODELS

ALBA is a comprehensive programme that goes beyond PetroCaribe. Its
philosophy of development challenges the western model of corporate
globalisation. At its core is a 'compensatory fund for structural
convergence' to manage and distribute financial aid to the most
economically vulnerable countries in the hemisphere. PetroCaribe and
similar arrangements (Petrosur and Petroandino) are the mechanisms
through which it proposes to do so in the Caribbean and Latin
America.

The western model of liberalisation and privatisation has failed to
address poverty in the region. After many years, Latin America
remains the region with the highest level of income inequality where
over 200 million black and indigenous people make up the mass of
unemployed and excluded. The quality of foreign investments has not
produced growth that reaches the poor and the quality of jobs has not
improved the dignity of life.

ALBA goes beyond trade to propose oil alliances, social banking, an
integrated Latin American media, health and literacy programmes,
support for national development, and food self-sufficiency to
address poverty. The FTAA is a limited idea with no arrangement to
assist countries suffering from natural disasters, oil shocks or
poverty. There is nothing in the FTAA to match an arrangement like
that of PetroCaribe and the kind of investments that Jamaica will get
to upgrade its petroleum refining capacity. The FTAA has nothing
different for a country like Haiti with special needs. ALBA promises
Haiti assistance in energy, health and education.

The FTAA excludes Cuba, but ALBA has a special role for Cuba and its
army of social professionals - medical and educational - willing to
deploy their skills to fight poverty throughout the hemisphere. ALBA
combines the resources of Venezuela, Latin America's largest oil
producer, with that of Cuba, the region's most developed country in
terms of social resources. ALBA is therefore most advanced between
Venezuela and Cuba. Both countries aim to make the region free of
illiteracy. Cuba has already made 1.5 million Venezuelan's literate
and Venezuela hopes to become the second country (after Cuba) to be
free of illiteracy in the next decade.

Cuba will help Venezuela this year to establish 600 diagnostic
centres, 600 rehabilitation and physiotherapy departments and 35 high
technology centres offering health-care services to Venezuelans free
of charge. Cuba will train 40,000 doctors and 5,000 health technology
specialists in Venezuela. Jamaicans and hundreds of thousands of
people in the region will be able to get free eye operations in Cuba
and Venezuela from this year. Cuba is providing 30,000 doctors and
other health care personnel to Venezuela. The FTAA offers none of
this.

ALBA AND DEMOCRACY

ALBA believes that the real threat to democracy comes from poverty
and exclusion. It favours a socially oriented form of regional
cooperation. The countries leading this form of cooperation,
Venezuela and Cuba, are precisely the two countries that the United
States deems to have undemocratic leaders. However, the model of free
trade, free markets and free elections supported by the FTAA, the IMF
and the 'development' policies of the World Bank exclude too many
from the benefits of democracy. None provide any special financial
oil facility to poor countries. They offer only austerity measures
for the poor and privatisation (of public wealth) to the rich in the
private sector.

ALBA's democratic philosophy is that the relations between states and
people should be motivated by humanitarian principles not by
profiteering off trade. This is exactly what oil market speculators
are doing to drive up prices. Chavez regards himself and his model of
development as a new form of socialism for the 21st century. His
socialism is much different from that of Cuba. He considers himself a
Christian socialist and uses Jesus' mission to the poor as his model.

In secular terms, Venezuela's press remains free, there is a mixed
economy with a role for the private sector, and there are no
political prisoners. Chavez himself has been freely elected and on
top of that convincingly won a referendum two years ago to continue
in office. He also calls for national reconciliation and democratic
elections in Haiti. Yet, the U.S. said Venezuela and Cuba are a
threat to stability in the region.

CARICOM believes otherwise. In his address to the Economic Commission
of Latin America in Chile a few days ago, Prime Minister Patterson
said of PetroCaribe: "The recent PetroCaribe Energy Cooperation
initiative extended by Venezuela to the countries of the Caribbean,
in the wake of rising oil prices, vividly demonstrates that there is
an inherent advantage by our uniting around a common vision, a
unifying objective and mutually beneficial set of goals for the
region." Let us join Latin Americans in appreciating the legacy of
Simon Bolivar and the developmental possibilities of that legacy
available under the Bolivarian Initiative.

You can send your comments to Robert.Buddan@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx or
infocus@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

.

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