Like most folks in the cultural field, I’m invited to various events or preludes to events, but since I’m not the most social of folks, I will generally pass. This week, however, knowing something of the reputation of Dr Keith Nurse, a Trini, from the Cave Hill campus of UWI, who is Senior Fellow at the Sir Arthur Lewis Institute of Social and Economic Studies there, and seeing that the subject was a regional plan for our cultural industries, I took a walk. In a time when such encounters in Guyana can be disappointing, this one, presented by the Ministry of Education (Department of Culture, Youth & Sport) in collaboration with the Caribbean Community Secretariat, was a standout.
Dr Nurse, who was introduced by Caricom’s Dr Hilary Brown, is the lead consultant on this Caricom project to (let me give the full label) Prepare the Regional Strategic Plan for Cultural and Entertainment Services/Cultural Industries in Caricom and Cariforum States. (The Caribbean Forum Group, known as Cariforum, was formed in 1992 as a grouping of 15 small developing countries in a unit to serve a base for economic dialogue with the European Union. It consists of Antigua and Barbuda, Bahamas, Barbados, Belize, Dominica, Dominican Republic, Grenada, Guyana, Haiti, Jamaica, St Kitts and Nevis, St Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, and Trinidad and Tobago.)
In the course of a two-hour presentation at the National Racquet Centre meeting room on Woolford Avenue, Dr Nurse displayed a clear understanding of the problems, existing and projected, in his remit, but he also came to Guyana (as he did to other Cariforum states) to elicit feedback from the 40 or so invitees in the room. Consultants often descend on us to pronounce, and Dr Nurse did some of that when it was warranted, but again and again he had clearly come here also to listen.
A discussion document circulated to attendees, said that strategies to be addressed in the report included “policy, legislation and institutional frameworks; investment and financing; innovation; intellectual property management; marketing and business support services; human resource development; research and data collection; inter-sectoral linkages, and the establishment of cultural districts.”
I know without asking that many of us in that room took away some learning from the two hours. We were made aware, for instance, of the financial leverage now available to film-makers, through being able to get loans based on tax credits governments are offering based on expenses for completed films. (Mahadeo Shivraj are you listening?)
Many in the room learned of the emergence of a regional organisation made up of our various intellectual property associations – Coscap, Cott, etc. (From personal knowledge, I know that this body had in fact offered to come to Guyana, at no cost to us, to help organise such an IP association here two years ago. I had relayed this offer to the relevant Minister, but the offer was never taken up.)
Listening to feedback from the assembly, Dr Nurse immediately identified the need for more thorough and sustained methods of data collection throughout the cultural industry sector here, and he made it a point to emphasise that as a priority for Guyana. He also stressed the need for high standards in products as well as the importance of developing our capabilities in the technological communication areas, and in the expansion of bandwidth for business and information purposes.
In the course of a wide-ranging discussion (it actually went past the allotted time), what was most impressive to me, was that Dr Nurse came to us with a good understanding of the “business realities” involved in his subject. In response to a suggestion from one participant that we should be producing handicraft through school, Dr Nurse immediately pointed out the essential need for identifying “markets” for such ventures. Throughout his presentation, one was always aware of the value of R&D in the cultural industries/services generally, and in a related aside he referred to the huge strides in the development of the country of Israel from just that approach.
In another example, that of the entertainment field, he emphasised another reality – that in countries with small populations or struggling economies, persons involved as creators (musicians, singers, dancers, animators, etc) would simply have to take their talents to foreign markets when the market at home proved small. It is a point that we sometimes take offence to, but like market size, it is a fact of life evident here.
In the overall, Dr Nurse did not come to us offering ‘pie in the sky’ notions – indeed, he was specific about taking practical and common sense approaches rather than daydreaming about “our talents” as some Caribbean artistes are disposed to do.
A significant plank is the suggestion that small struggling economies would be able to succeed with “cluster” approaches to cultural entity development, which they could not handle on their own.
If memory serves, the handover of the report to Caricom is a couple of months away, and while the track record of the organisation may give us pause for at least a tinge of concern about what the released project report will say, based on the deportment and delivery of Dr Nurse here, we are left with high expectations.
In this relatively short column, I could not begin to delineate all the aspects covered in this session, but I cannot fail to include Dr Nurse’s reaction to my question concerning the poor Caribbean track record on regional ventures. If you read this column, you know that is one of the things at the front of my mind. His response was that, originally a sceptic himself, he has seen in his recent various discussions with Cariforum members during this project that the “stand alone” positions are changing. He said that several governments have indicated being fully on board with the idea of a regional plan for our “cultural economy”. Among the range of items of substance that were caught in the two hours, it was indeed good to hear that such a critical shift may be taking place in attitudes to regional cooperation.
