Overview

The Basics

Barbados is a relatively flat island located in the eastern Caribbean Sea just north of Trinidad in the eastern Caribbean. The low-lying tablelands eventually rise from a series of terraces to Mount Hillaby. The northeastern area of the island is rocky and has been eaten away at by the strong surrounding surf. The majority of the island is coral limestone and free of permanent rivers. The clear seas surrounding the island are full of natural coral reefs and gorgeous white, sandy beaches make-up the perimeter of the island.

Barbados has a mild subtropical climate with a dry season from December through June. The heat of the dry season is mitigated by the northeast trade winds. The trade winds once again save the day during the humid and hot wet season keeping the weather pleasant. Although Barbados is located on the southern edge of the West Indian hurricane zone, the island has not been troubled by hurricanes in recent years.

The island established a wildlife reserve in 1985 to protect the extremely diverse population of tropical flora not already displaced by sugar cane farms.

The islands only seaport is located at the capital, Bridgetown. Barbados also has an international airport, Grantly Adams International Airport, offering direct flights to destinations in the United States, the Caribbean, and Europe.

Although English is the official language of the island, English Creole is spoken by a large percentage of the population. The nearly 300,000 residence of Barbados live in close contact with one another. The majority of the population, 90%, is of African descent. The rest of the population is of European or Asian origin. The dominant religions are Protestant and Roman Catholic. The nation has a reputation for having highly educated and literate citizens.

Prior to being claimed for King James I of England in 1625, Barbados was temporarily occupied by the Arawak and Carib Indians as well as the Spaniards. For most of the next twenty years, British colonists brought laborers and African slaves to the island to work their tobacco, cotton, and indigo plantations and later sugar plantations. By the beginning of the 19th century, the island was home to 745 plantations and nearly 100,000 slaves, both African and of African descent. When slavery was abolished throughout the British Empire in 1833, indentured servants of Asian descent took over the work on the plantations.

Although essentially a plaything of the plantation owners who have historically dominated the country into the 20th century, the Barbados House of Assembly was founded in 1639. Voter franchise grew throughout the 1940s and both political rights and the structure of the economy have steadily improved since this time. Also in the 1940s, a two party system composed of the Bardados Labour Party (BLP) and the Democratic Labour Party (DLP) developed. These two parties have alternately shared power since their inception.

Before becoming an independent sovereign within the Commonwealth based upon its own actions in 1966, Barbados was a member of the separatist Federation of the West Indies.

Government and Economy

The government of Barbados is a parliamentary democracy based on the Westminster model. Barbados’s head of state is the Queen of England, who is represented locally by a Governor-General.

Barbados’s parliament is known as the House of Assembly and has 30 members, who are elected for a maximum period of 5 years under universal suffrage. As with other parliamentary democracies, the Prime Minister is the leader of the largest party. The Governor-General appoints the Prime Minister’s cabinet. The senate has 21 Senate, twelve of whom are appointed by the Governor-General on the advice of the Prime Minister, two are appointed on the advice of the Opposition Leader, and the remaining seven are appointed at the Governor-General\'s discretion.

For a time, Barbados executed politically motivated populist economic policies that were unsuccessfully resisted by international organizations. These policies lead Barbados to economic problems in the 1980s, which were reversed by an International Monetary Fund structural adjustment package during the mid-1990s.

Barbados has made a concerted effort to diversify its economy, which has been and still is largely dominated by sugar. This effort has only been somewhat successful. In the past Barbados generally sold its sugar to the European Union at a preferential tariff under the Lome Convention, which ended in 2006. The scheme with which the European Union replaced Lome Convention is not anywhere near as generous. Of its efforts to diversify the economy, tourism has been one of Barbados’s success stories and currently accounts for 15% of the GDP and half of foreign exchange earnings. In addition, there has been a great deal of growth in the area of light industry and the high-technology sector has a bright future on the island. Furthermore, Barbados has been working to develop its indigenous energy sources and may eventually become self-sufficient. Historically speaking, Barbados has also made the development of its offshore financial services sector a priority. As a result of the government’s efforts, the offshore financial services sector is the second biggest contributor of foreign exchange only beaten out by tourism.