Barbados PM seeks to reverse brain drain

Barbados and other Caribbean nations have endured the loss of their highly skilled and educated labor to the United States, Canada and other developed nations in what is commonly known as the “brain drain”.

Barbados, in an attempt to reverse the trend and capitalize on brain power, has established a framework that seeks to attract the skills and expertise of their nationals overseas to enhance the country’s socio-economic development.

Prime Minister Freundel Stuart (pictured), recently enticed Rhodes Scholar Marston Gibson to return home to accept the post of Chief Justice. The 57-year-old former president of the Council of Barbados Organizations in New York, who emigrated to the United States in 1987, was sworn in last month.

“It’s my view that Barbados has to be redefined,” Stuart said in his keynote address at the Democratic Labor Party (DLP) Canada chapter’s annual fundraising dinner last Saturday night in Scarborough, Ontario. “When we think of Barbados, we should think not only of those people on the island, but also of our nationals in the diaspora, and it’s our subtle conviction that they should now be fully integrated into what it is we are attempting to do in our country.

This was Stuart’s first visit to Canada. He was sworn in as Barbados’ seventh Prime Minister following the death of David Thompson.

Stuart went on to say that Barbados is elevating the concept of remittances beyond money to social remittances, and that the nation is interested in the skills acquired by Barbados nationals in the diaspora.