The Basics

St. Kitts, along with Nevis, is an island about one-third of the way from Puerto Rico to Trinidad and Tobago in the Caribbean Sea. The two islands form the Federation of St. Kitts and Nevis. While they share a government and most legislation, there are some important legislative differences between the two islands that particularly affect participants in the offshore market.

St. Kitts is a volcanic island that is acclaimed for its for gorgeous mountain scenery. Together, St. Kitts and Nevis have a total landmass of 261 sq km in area and are separated by a three-kilometer wide channel called The Narrows. The Great Salt Pond is located on the southern tip of the long, baseball bat-shaped St. Kitts. Nevis Peak is located in the center of its rather baseball-shaped namesake island and its ball shape complements that of its sister island.

Both islands have a warm tropical climate that is cooled by year around sea breezes. Although there is little seasonal temperature variation, there is a rainy season between the months of May and November and the islands are often troubled by hurricanes from July to October.

The landscape of Nevis is dominated by Nevis Peak, which reaches a total height of 3,265 feet at the center of the island. Most of Nevis’s population resides in the island’s the capital of Charlestown, located on the western side of the island. Despite the fact that Nevis has a typical West Indies maritime tropical climate, the highest temperatures are offset by northeasterly trade winds and humidity is relatively low.

The Federation capital is Basseterre, located on St Kitts, and there are harbors at Basseterre and Charlestown on Nevis. Bradshaw International Airport, near Basseterre, is equipped to handle large jets. Nevis’s Newcastle Airport is only capable of handling light aircraft.

Airline services to and from the Federation have improved in recent years and now it is possible to catch direct flights from New York, Philadelphia, Miami, and Gatwick as well as to other Caribbean islands.

Christopher Columbus was the first European to christen the islands. He was so deeply impressed by the central mountain of Nevis, which are circled in white mist that looks like snow, that he named the island “Nuestro Senora del las Nieves” (“Our Lady of the White Snows”) in 1492. Over the time, the name of the island was shortened to Nevis.

After the British established a colony on St. Kitts, the island became Britain\'s first colony in the West Indies in 1623. Nevis was settled by the British five years later and a period of intermittent warfare between the British, French and Spanish followed. The French eventually took possession of the island of Nevis in 1706. Although the island was ceded to Britain by the treaty of Utrecht in 1713, fighting continued until 1782 at which time it was once again captured by the French. Nevis remained in French hands until it was officially returned to Britain in 1783 under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles. From this moment on, St. Kitts and Nevis were both governed as part of the colony of the Leeward Islands and then part of the West Indies Federation until 1967 when they became a governing state in association with Great Britain.

In 1983 the Federation of St. Kitts and Nevis finally attained full political independence. As a concession to Nevisians who were anxious about ceding too much power to the Kittians, Nevis obtained autonomy within the Federation, along with its own Legislature and Cabinet. Nevertheless, a 1998 vote on Nevis about a referendum to separate from Saint Kitts fell short of the two-thirds majority needed.

Despite the legislative defeat, Nevis\'s desire for independence is not dead. Federation Prime Minister Dr. Denzil L. Douglas suggested Round Table talks with the Cabinets of the Federal Government and the Nevis Island Administration, major social partners and key operatives, to look the options and ramifications of the possible secession of Nevis from the Federation in 2004 although he clearly stated that his preference was for both islands to stay together.

In a televised statement in June 2006 Vance Amory, Former Prime Minister of Nevis, announced that independence for his island continued to be goal of his government. Joseph Parry of the Nevis Reformation Party replaced Armory after an election in July 2006 and there have since been signs of rapprochement between the two islands.

Nevis has created separate \'offshore\' legislation parallel to Federation legislation. A significant number of Nevisians attribute its economic progress to having greater control over its own affairs.

As of July 2007, the Federation’s population was estimated to be greater than 39,350. Much of the population is descendents from African slaves brought to the islands to work sugar and tobacco crops and indentured servants and small farmers who stayed on even after the world drop in sugar prices in the mid-1800s made plantation farming less than profitable.

The official language of both islands is English.