One of the stranger aspects of the Caribbean is the disjunction between the many reports and studies produced by academic or multilateral institutions and the thinking of those intimately involved in the industries concerned.

In recent weeks I have had reason to take an interest in why this should be and its implications, and have begun to wonder about the practical value of many of the reports that come across my desk on questions about everything from the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) to currency wars and employment levels.

This is not to be critical of the many interesting studies that are produced, but to wonder why it is that so many of these documents appear to have been written in a vacuum; apparently without reference to those who direct the industries that enable the Caribbean to survive.

This is particularly baffling when it comes to tourism, where so many documents fail to address or even recognise its role. Instead, most look past the effect that this economically dominant industry is having on the majority of Caribbean economies, provide and analysis that shows little understanding of the internal or external dynamics that drive the industry, and frequently fail to recognise the effect that the industry now has on the wider Caribbean economy.

So frustrating has this become that I have adopted a small but simple experiment to assess any electronically available study relating to the Caribbean economy or to regional development. Using the ‘find’ tool I look to see how many times the word tourism appears. The results are for the most part shocking. They leave one feeling that many in Caribbean academia, in multilateral and regional institutions, and in private sector associations and NGOs, have little awareness or information on how, over the last decade, the industry’s growth has become central to the region’s future economic performance.

Why so few reports fail to fully incorporate the tourism economy is worth considering.

One reason would seem to be because there are few reliable or current statistics that disaggregate the industry in the context of its direct and indirect economic contribution. In part this appears to be because few if any governments and central banks are doing much more than trying to capture the number of visitors and their spend. Another reason is because the international institutions are slow in producing tourism specific studies or statistics and appear unable to disaggregate the figures for Latin America and the Caribbean in their reporting.

A further and more fundamental reason may be that this is reflection of a view that unlike agriculture, tourism is somehow an industry that is not organic to the region, has been imposed by foreigners, is economically expedient, is private sector driven, and has not the philosophical underpinning or nobility some associate with labour.

This is of course nonsense as not only has the industry become fully integrated into all aspects of almost all Caribbean economies but is to a significant extent indigenously owned, employing more workers than anyone other than the public sector.

This has the consequence that it is hard to find accurate figures for everything from the true value of the industry or comparisons by country as to its value relative to other Caribbean sectors. It also means that it’s fiscal impact, the indirect employment that tourism generates, its net value or even the social benefit or problems it creates remain largely inaccessible. Practically this makes it hard for instance to provide accurate forecasts on the effects of external imposed tourism related taxes on the Caribbean economy. More importantly it means that it is difficult to understand what the effect of changing tourism taxes, price, visitor perception, marketing and all else that effects the industry is having on the future economic prospects of the Caribbean.

This means that most analysis has to rely on external commercially derived data from those in the industry who readily admit that they do not have the detailed holistic evidence often required to drive home the point they are making.

One outcome is that most have come to rely for up to date analysis on the excellent but relatively general reports produced by the World Travel and Tourism Council commissioned by the Caribbean Hotels and Tourism Association and others.

What these reports mainly do is highlight the headline figures in order to emphasise the importance of tourism to Governments, workers and visitors. They are what the industry has used to drive a region wide information campaign in the media and in hotels and at airports about the importance of the industry to the regional economy and employment.

The most recent WTTC report published in May 2010 could not be clearer. It shows that travel and tourism plays a proportionately stronger role in both GDP and employment creation in the Caribbean than any other comparable region in the world. It forecasts that in 2010, the industry will account for an average 12.4 per cent of total GDP, using a measurement that includes both direct and indirect effects along with the impact of investment, government collective consumption and tourism related merchandise. The same report forecasts that the industry will account for 10.9 per cent of economy-wide jobs in the Caribbean.

What is important is that these figures conceal a wide disparity between individual economies. In the largest, the Dominican Republic, Cuba and Puerto Rico, travel and tourism is relatively less intensive whereas in many of the regions medium and smaller economies tourism’s share of GDP is often in excess of 30 per cent of GDP.

But what is need is more detail, analysis and accurate forecasting coming from within the region by bodies such as  the Universities, Caricom and the Caribbean Development Bank so that  governments, institutions and the private sector develop  a  detailed expertise, analysis and policy capability.This is not be taken to suggest that everything involving tourism is satisfactory, but to argue that what is lacking is a well defined understanding at all levels of the macro economic role that the region’s most important export industry plays in the Caribbean economy. Tourism and its allied sectors such as aviation have become many times more important in policy terms than older industries. Properly integrated, understood and linked to new markets it has the capacity to create significant development. Those who study or advise on economic policy continue ignore this at the region’s peril.

David Jessop is the Director of the Caribbean Council and can be contacted at david.jessop@caribbean-council.org

Previous columns can be found at www.caribbean-council.org