St Vincent facing immense challenges since 2020, Gonsalves tells UNGA

"by" St Vincent Times

Prime Minister Ralph Gonsalves told the UN General Assembly last week that St Vincent and the Grenadines has had to face immense challenges since March 2020, and continuing.

Gonsalves said In March 2020, the COVID-19 pandemic arrived upon SVG like the proverbial thief in the night.

“Although we did not close our country down, not even in the darkest days of the pandemic, much of the world locked down on us. Life, living, and production were, and still are, badly affected”.

Gonsalves said in April 2021, St Vincent suffered 32 volcanic eruptions which caused widespread destruction of property, immense social dislocation, immiseration of our people, and the evacuation of one-fifth of the population into emergency shelters in early July 2021, Hurricane Elsa struck resulting in further loss and damage.

 On Russia -Ukraine war and its effect on SVG Gonsalves said;

“In late February 2022, open hostilities between Russia and Ukraine erupted, which exacerbated the economic turmoil which was already brewing, globally. The knock-on effects of the Russia-Ukraine war has been terrible for faraway St. Vincent and the

Grenadines, and our Caribbean. Prices of basic commodities such as imported fuel, food, fertiliser, and hand tools have gone through the roof”.

“All these exogenous shocks piled upon the extant vulnerabilities and limitations of a small island developing state, inclusive of the ravages of climate change; the challenges arising from the contemporary global political economy; and the historical legacies of underdevelopment which flow from native genocide, the enslavement of African bodies, the indentureship of Madeirans and Indians, and an awful colonial over-rule”.

A Resilient people

Gonsalves said Vincentians are resilient people and not people of lamentation. He said the nation is recovering and embracing fresh hope.

“We in St. Vincent and the Grenadines are working hard and smart, but without a fair and just economic order globally, an especial regard for “small island exceptionalism”, the global architecture of enlightened multilateralism, and internationalist solidarity, our herculean national efforts are unlikely to yield the requisite abundant fruit. Trying to go up a fast-moving down-escalator is a challenging exercise”.

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