The EU sugar reform and the responses of Caribbean sugar producers

ABSTRACT

Economic geographers and political ecologists have developed valuable analyses of the ways in which the effects of economic globalisation and macro-economic ‘one-size-fits-all’ policies are unevenly distributed. Unpacking the global-local nexus, geographers have argued that such policies evoke heterogeneous responses and results. This article contributes to this body of work by discussing the effect of the European Union Sugar Reform for two specific Caribbean localities: Barbados and St Kitts. It first highlights how political decisions made in one locality have significant ramifications for places and peoples at a distance. Second, it suggests the importance of recognising our global interconnectivity and in considering how our responsibilities to/for distant strangers emerge through our historically-embedded production, trading and consumption habits. Third, this analysis shows the integral way in which geography matters; how one unilateral change in a common sugar trading policy can generate a multiplicity of different effects and responses in different places.