Since the late 2000s the number of British visitors to Barbados has fallen considerably. We investigate demographics and travel patterns and find that the ‘new‘ visitor is very different from the pre-2008 visitor, with different spending patterns, demographic characteristics and travel planning behaviour. This shift raises important considerations about the future of the British market in Barbados.
One of the indirect effects of the global financial crisis on Barbados has been a reduction in visitor arrivals. While arrivals from all of Barbados’ main source markets felt the impact, the British market has been particularly hard hit: not only has the total number of visitors declined, but visitor expenditure has also fallen. There are a number of potential explanations that have ben posited. We examine these theories in this article.
The downside risks to our forecasts for the Barbados economy are particularly prevalent in the consumer market, as consumers are likely to bear the brunt of the budgetary measures introduced by the Government of Barbados in June 2018. Growth in nominal personal consumption has been depressed since 2014, a trend we expect to continue in 2018.
Increasing Downside Risks in Consumer Market Outlook for 2018 Read More »
There are many downside risks impacting on our outlook for the Barbados economy in 2018. Barbados is currently facing a number of economic challenges: it has one of the highest debt to GDP ratios in the world, it recently defaulted on its external debt obligations, the fiscal deficit remains stubbornly high and its stock of international reserves (in months of imports) is below international benchmarks.
The Articles of Agreement of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) propose that one of the fundamental objectives of the IMF should be to make the pooled resources of its members temporarily available to other member states in order to address any balance‐of‐payments disequilibria. To ensure the loans that they provide to members are repaid, the IMF also asks borrowers to enter into a programme. These programs usually specify performance criteria for key macroeconomic variables, such as ceilings on the fiscal deficit, the central bank’s lending to government, as well as a floor on net international reserves.
Antilles Economics conducted a survey of Barbadian consumer’s perceptions of economic conditions in May 2018, around the time of the general election. Respondents were pessimistic about their households’ current conditions, with 45% saying that their household’s situation was worse today than one year ago.
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