Autopilot or a Hands on Approach

An autopilot is a system that engages the controls of an aircraft to maintain it in a stable flight condition and no course for the intended destination. It is an aid to reduce pilot fatigue by removing the burden of having to constantly have his hands and feet on the controls to adjust for minor turbulence or minute changes in the weight and balance of the aircraft. However should an emergency arise or severe weather encountered the pilot will disengage the autopilot assume direct control of the aircraft.

I knew of some pilots who were so confident of the performance of the autopilot and had such great faith that nothing would malfunction that they would engage the autopilot and leave the flight deck unattended. That they survived the flight could only be ascribed to an overworked guardian angel.

Today there is evidence that Barbados has been on autopilot for way too long and that there are some who are in denial about the magnitude of the economic threats that we face. Granted that much of the problems were not of our own making and the global financial crisis has impacted heavily upon us. But if we are honest we must recognize that some of the problems that we face are of our own making and that we have the capacity to implement corrective action that will, at least in part, address the external and internal challenges that we face.

It is way past time for us to disengage the autopilot and to address the issues of productivity, efficiency and structural changes to organizations in both the public sector and the business community. The mantras of “we like it so” and “it will do” have no place in today's world. I is time to put aside the parables and obfuscation in the messages that we send to the public and engage in some plain direct speaking.

The wishful hope that we will see a 2 percent growth in the economy next year is just that, a wishful hope. We need to come to grips with the reality that property markets that generated so much direct foreign investment in the past has virtually ground to a halt. By borrowing to shore up foreign reserves will only buy us a bit of time to put our house in order by restructuring government institutions and businesses alike to drive economic growth that will either earn or husband foreign exchange in the aftermath of the deepest and most prolonged financial crisis since the great depression.

In doing so we must urgently address the internal impediments that we have consciously or unintentionally created that impedes the growth of the financial services industry. Food production and distribution is also a critical component for employment and foreign exchange earning and the Ministry of Agriculture is not structured to meet the challenges of food production in a landscape of a declining sugar industry.

The business community also faces multiple challenges and must meet the consumer demand for better prices that can be achieved by improving inventory flows and control that reduces the time between ordering a product and getting it on the shelf.

We have hit some violent economic turbulence and its time to ask, “is there anyone on the flight deck?”