US interests and viewpoints on the Dominican Republic and other Latin/Central/Caribbean nations with regards to development.

The United States currently is at a cross roads with its fellow neighbors in the Western Hemisphere.  It has recently signed free trade agreements ranging from DR-CAFTA and CAFTA. These agreements open up markets over time for all countries involved and may lead to increased economic prosperity or an increase in tensions as the loss of a economic sector in one country may lead to feelings of distrust and anger. Currently under the Obama Administration, the United States is aggressively trying to help develop its neighbors’ capacity for economic development. This reasoning can be found from a report from Mark Feierstein who is the Assistant Administrator for Latin America and the Caribbean for USAID who in an address to the Foreign Relations committee of the United States Senate described the current administration’s goal with President Obama’s statement of  “creating the conditions where our assistance is no longer needed." (Feirestein 1) This sentiment has been reflected in the many lectures, interviews, and conversations that I have had in the Dominican Republic. It seems as if the emphasis is slowly being shifted from just financial based aid to helping the Dominican Republic and other Central American Countries develop their own trade capacities as to help not only facilitate their own economies but to allow the United States to have access to more markets that can help fuel its own economic growth. Also, there has been a noticeable shift from distributing funds solely to foreign governments to distributing funds to local entities that are better prepared to provide the right type of development that can lead to economic growth. This is evident in the statement “long-term development and job creation depend upon an active and vibrant private sector. By partnering with private companies, we not only leverage resources; we create durable enterprises that will provide long-term development dividends.” (Feirestein 1) It seems that if the United States has finally learned its lesson from solely distributing aid just because a country demonstrates a need because often this aid is wasted or misused with inefficient or corrupt governments. The focus seems to be placed on providing the aid to institutions that are directly involved with a local community. This approach has positives and negatives. On one hand the approach allows for a direct investment in developing local communities needs such as helping to create agricultural clusters, agricultural education, or promoting a certain types of agricultural technologies such as greenhouses.  The other side to this coin is that the government of that said country is left out in the cold and is often not on the same page with the institution that is sponsoring the aid project. This can cause contradictions in goals and efficiency issues that were mentioned in my first blog post regarding issues with agriculture in the Dominican Republic.  Overall however, these efforts are a positive for the United States since by developing a country like the Dominican Republic they boost a market for its own goods.  This is even more evident when considering fact that the Dominican Republic is one of the largest importers of US goods and according to CIA World Factbook even after the global economic crisis its economy “still remained one of the fastest growing in the region.” (The World Factbook).

-RJ