Without a doubt, Caribbean countries are going digital. But it is unclear how much progress has been made and where there are still gaps that need to be filled. USAID recently published the results of a digital ecosystem study it conducted across 11 Caribbean countries. We speak with researchers, Chelceé Brathwaite and Matthew Cowen, and USAID regional head, Mansfield Blackwood, on the study’s findings and recommendations, and what should be the next step for Caribbean countries.

 

This episode is also available on SoundCloud, Apple iTunes, Google Play Music, Spotify, Amazon Music and Stitcher!

Increasingly, becoming more digital has been top of mind across the Caribbean region, and all segments of Caribbean society. So far, there has been a hubbub of excitement and activity, such as with respect to digital transformation in the public and private sectors, and countries placing more emphasis on developing their digital economies. However, It does not yet appear that we have developed any metrics to help us gauge our progress in ‘going digital’.

In late September, the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) published a Digital Ecosystem Country Assessment (DECA) for the Eastern and Southern Caribbean, which according to the press release, “…outlines the key aspects of the region’s digital ecosystem and provides 10 recommendations … to create a more inclusive, safe, and enabling environment to achieve development outcomes…” The assessment covered 11 countries: Antigua and Barbuda, The Bahamas, Barbados, Dominica, Grenada, Guyana, Saint and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, and Trinidad and Tobago.

The exercise examined the state of the digital ecosystem in the 11 stated countries across three pillars:

  • Pillar 1: Digital infrastructure and adoption,
  • Pillar 2:  Digital society, rights, and governance
  • Pillar 3:  Digital economy

In addition to discussing the situation found under each pillar, and sharing brief case studies or exemplars as appropriate, the report concludes by outlining 10 recommendations that countries and the Caribbean region as a whole could consider to meaningfully advance their digital ecosystems. In this episode, we chat with two of the researchers and the USAID regional head for countries covered under the report.  

 

Introducing our guests

Mansfield Blackwood

 

Mansfield Blackwood is the Partner Country Systems (G2G) Advisor for USAID in the Eastern and Southern Caribbean through which he manages relations and partnerships between USAID, governments across eleven countries in the Eastern and Southern Caribbean as well as regional organisations such as the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States and the Caribbean Community Secretariat. These partnerships are done in alignment with USAID’s multi-country/multi-country strategy to support the region. He also directly manages resilience initiatives focusing on climate change, disaster risk reduction, and clean energy.

 

 

 

Chelceé Brathwaite

Chelceé Brathwaite was one of the researchers for the study and currently is a Trade Researcher at the Shridath Ramphal Centre for International Trade Law, Policy and Services, at the University of the West Indies, Cave Hill Campus. She has conducted research on e-commerce and digital trade, web3 developments and their potential to enable trade in the orange economy, and innovation and industrial policy, among other areas. She was also a part-time lecturer for the graduate course e-Commerce and the New International Economy, and has worked as a technical researcher on several consultancies. 

Chelceé is passionate about the development of her country and region, and remains motivated by the desire to see Caribbean islands take advantage of these new opportunities to build economic resilience and support sustainable development. We had her on the podcast a few months ago, with Yacine Khelladi, to jumpstart our conversation on the digital economy.

 

Matthew Cowen

Matthew Cowen was one of the researchers for the study and is an IT Specialist, Researcher and Digital Analyst, who specialises in ICT in the Caribbean region. He is also the Founder of dgtlfutures, a consulting firm that helps small businesses across the Caribbean to develop and implement their digital transformation strategies. And he is also the author of The Future is Digital newsletter, and is based in Martinique.

Matthew has been on the Podcast quite a few times, and in January, we discussed the emerging issues and opportunities of Artificial intelligence, which was a follow-on of an earlier conversation we had in 2021 on how technology can perpetuate bias.

 

 

Insight into our conversation

The DECA report is quite comprehensive and chocked full of data and information collated from several sources, which were supplemented with several interviews. It should thus come as no surprise that Chelceé and Matthew had a huge task to condense the key findings and recommendations made in the report into the time we had allowed.

One of the points that was repeated throughout our conversation was that countries were on the right track. But of course, some countries were a bit more advanced than others. However, there was also a concern that ensuring inclusion was not always top of mind when initiatives were conceptualised. Recently, much is being made about financial inclusion for the unbanked and underbanked, but there is a wider lens that would include persons with disabilities, children and youth and women, for example, that is not always considered.

Below are key questions posed during this interview.

  1. What was the impetus for embarking on this study?
  2. What was it hoped that the study would achieve?
  3. How did the team go about executing the study? What was the methodology employed?
  4. How did the team manage the data and information gaps that exist in countries and in the region?
  5. What were the key findings of the study?
  6. What are important recommendations that have been made?
  7. What should be the next steps for Caribbean countries?

 

We would love to hear from you!

Do leave us a comment either here beneath this article, or on our Facebook or LinkedIn pages, or via Twitter, @ICTPulse.

Also, if you or a member of your network is interested in joining us for an episode, do get in touch.

Let’s make it happen!

 

Below are links to some of the organisations and resources that either were mentioned during the episode or otherwise, might be useful:

 

 

Images credit:  USAID; C Brathwaite;  M Cowen;  Indissoluble Indissoluble (flickr); Jonas Leupe (Unsplash)

Music credit: The Last Word (Oui Ma Chérie), by Andy Narrell

Podcast editing support:  Mayra Bonilla Lopez