MONTSERRAT
Business in the
midst of a volcanic crisis
By Wesley Gibbins
on assignment
Sixteen months into the volcanic crisis in Montserrat, the economy of the tiny British colony has moved from faltering steps backward and forward to being very much on its hands and knees. In any event, the 40-square mile island has not exported more than EC$34 million (EC$1 = US$0.37) in milled rice and cotton in many years and its 1993 GDP barely exceeded EC$160 million.
Had it not been for continued activity at the East Caribbean
Rice Mills, operated by the St Vincent-based Eastern Caribbean
Group of Companies, under the shadow of the Soufriere Hills in
the abandoned city of Plymouth, Montserrat would have surely been
relying for its survival almost exclusively on a £25 million
package of emergency aid from Britain - finances that had originally
been earmarked to facilitate a total evacuation of the island.
Every day, mill workers present their emergency passes to police officers and soldiers on the outskirts of the city and brave dangers described by volcanologists as being persistently imminent. "The mill has kept the island going," says British-born communications consultant to the Montserrat Government, Richard Aspin.
In 1995, the island derived more than 40% of its revenue from import duties, consumption tax and customs service charges. That's virtually gone and income tax is fast becoming an irrelevance as the number of employed has shrunk beyond recognition with the massive exodus from the island over recent months.
The island's rudimentary tourism industry is in shambles with a majority of its resort facilities situated in the off-limits southern area, inaccessible even to those tourists defying internationally circulated warnings about visiting the island. So hard has been the island's luck that when its first cruise ship arrival in many months eventually docked at Olveston on November 12, the day after general elections, rain washed out proceedings and a planned street market in the makeshift capital of Salem had to be abandoned.
Clover Lea, a US expatriate who has been living in Montserrat since 1980, had spent the last few days preparing her hand-crafted papier-mache jewelry for sale. "Oh well, I'll just have to wait for the next ship," she said.
But the next ship may well be a British emergency vessel and rumours abound of such vessels being already on the way. Governor Frank Savage has earned considerable respect for his role in working with the government to keep things going. But, back in London, an offer to house, feed and care for the island's population still stands and Montserrat residents live with the perpetual reality of off-island relocation.
But it's not an offer the more than 5,000 remaining Montserratians
seem prepared to take up. When it rained ash and mud in September,
80-year-old Sonny Riley did not even leave Plymouth. "I not
going anywhere," he said. "When my time come, it come."
Like many others, he experienced the quite unsatisfactory conditions
of the emergency shelters. His wife, he claims, is pining away
in one in Salem. 
Also not moving from Plymouth, at least for now, is a supermarket run by Indian-born businessman Manuchandi Ramani. He is currently building a massive shopping complex in the north of the island, but for the moment he's doing a lucrative trade in Plymouth. People acquire emergency passes to do their shopping in the downtown supermarket. Wipe the volcanic ash from the bottle and wealthy expats, politicians and a few rich locals can get a good deal on fine European champagne.
Ramani's local counterparts have not been faring as well. In the north, relocated supermarkets are operating out of metal cargo containers. Prices are high and food stamps are common currency. Business is down and prices are reaching unacceptably high levels.
Twenty-two year old construction worker Glenroy Riley is hoping that aid flows to help develop the northern "safe" areas will bring some much needed money his way. Largely due to the island's relaxed policy on land acquisitions by non-nationals, people like Riley have seen much better days. In the 1980's the construction industry earned a mint.
Despite the existence of Alien Landholding regulations, non-Montserratians were able to gobble up substantial portions of the relatively undeveloped north - now prime property as the government aims to relocate the population northward. Over the past decade, Americans and Europeans have benefited from an offer to buy scenic properties overlooking the Caribbean Sea, via a process of Landholders Licenses that netted for the government about 8.5% of the proceeds of land sales.
Today, the office of newly-elected Chief Minister Bertrand
Osborne is situated in a house built by a wealthy US family in
the upscale area of Olveston. Like many expat landowners, their
premises are now vacant. One local businessman hired to ensure
the upkeep of one property confesses he has housed a needy family
there.
"What else could I have done?" he asks.
Indeed, the availability of Crown land is very much an issue nowadays. Most of its remaining holdings are in the south of the island. Private property owners are being asked to compromise a little, as scarce space is allocated to relocated residents. Space is so scarce that even the evacuation of about 800 residents in the marginally unsafe town of Cork Hill had to be delayed. Volcanologists say the situation is an absolute no-no. In the event of pyroclastic flow in that direction, few will escape the 1000 degree heat of molten rock or solid emissions.
Last September, the main road through Cork Hill was virtually impassable as the gravel, pumice and ash fall of a phreatic eruption sent residents scampering for cover. In early November, with an Orange Alert out, there was no room further north for these people. Hardware dealer Donaldson Romeo, who has taken leave from his business to campaign for better conditions for shelter victims, says the situation is unacceptable.
"This can't work," Romeo says. "People have been living in danger in Cork Hill and the others have been living in shelters not fit for human beings." Like many businesses, Romeo's hardware store has been operating on unrealistically high levels of credit transactions. The store, once considered one of the most successful indigenous businesses, now operates out of a makeshift wooden structure at the side of the road in Salem.
Midge Kocen, an American who has lived in Montserrat for over 26 years, sums up the situation: "Montserrat is the story of the disaster that has not yet happened," she says. Her conclusion captures the reality of a society whose battle with imminent disaster is turning out to be as painful as the disaster itself.
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