A Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) study in 2007 commented as follows: "The Caribbean Community has the highest rate of emigration in the world - a regional average of about 35 per cent of the labour force has migrated to OECD countries since 1965."

It further stated that many people who leave Jamaica are well-educated. On average, 73 per cent of college/university graduates left the region in the period since Independence, and for Jamaica, the estimate of emigrating graduates is approximately 80 per cent.

My own view is that these estimates are on the high side. What cannot be disputed, however, is the fact that large numbers of our professional workforce, as well as large numbers of our total workforce emigrate primarily to North America and Europe. The implications of this massive emigration are many and varied. In the context of world-trade liberalisation with the free movement of capital but not labour, the reduction of tariffs and the elimination of most other trade barriers, Jamaica and the Caribbean in general anticipated that capital and businesses would flow into the region.

Jamaica's proximity to North America, both physical and cultural, combined with English as our primary language, was thought to make us a preferred country to benefit from outsourcing by companies in the developed world. Jamaica has not, however, seen a significant inflow of new businesses but rather, it is our nationals who have emigrated to the jobs. Many of the jobs filled by our nationals and other emigrants are in areas that outsourcing is either not possible or not viable at this time, such as health, education, construction, hospitality and agriculture. Jamaican emigrants, however, work in all sectors of their new home economy.

Ageing population

Despite the world recession, the expectation is that the need for workers in the developed world and in particular North America in the sectors where many of our emigrants work, will continue for some time as their ageing population increases.

It is instructive to note, however, that, as anticipated, much outsourcing from North America and Europe has indeed taken place but the major beneficiaries have been China, India and other Asian countries. Small lower-middle to upper-middle income island economies do not have the advantage of large blocks of highly skilled but relatively low-wage workers that appear to be a requirement for attracting significant outsourcing business.

The demand by Jamaicans for tertiary and professional training is and will continue to be strong for many years, and it is highly unlikely that the Jamaican economy will absorb the volume of new graduates and professionals. We can, therefore, expect that the exodus of professionals and tertiary-level graduates will continue unabated. The investment expenditure in years of education for these emigrants ranges between 10 and 17 years, from primary school through to graduates of professional schools. No estimate of the cost of this investment expenditure exists, but for Jamaica, we can safely assume that the cost accumulates to billions of dollars.

In addition to the investment expenditure cost, there are the very real emotional and financial costs of parentless homes, as emigrants often, at least initially, leave children behind. Any high-school principal will confirm that there are many in their student body whose parents live abroad, and in some cases, the students live in homes with no adult supervision. The children of absent parents can pose special problems of discipline and attendance. Perhaps the most dramatic demonstration of the increase in emigration is the continued increase in remittance flows over the last 10 to 15 years. This is proof both of the quantity and quality of our emigrants.

Remittances to Jamaica in 2008 were almost as large as all our exports put together, and at over US$2billion, were as large as our current NIR, 30 times larger than our total exports to Caricom and compares favourably to the amount of funds we are seeking from the International Monetary Fund (IMF). It would be an interesting exercise to compare the remittance inflows with the cost of say, 15 years of schooling.

Between a rock and a hard place

Jamaica finds itself between a rock and a hard place as we all accept that a better-educated workforce is a necessary requirement for a genuine transformation of our economy and, therefore, we must continue to spend on secondary and tertiary-level education and must also accept, at least in the short run, the inevitability of significant loss of our trained workforce through emigration. A major concern must, therefore, be whether this loss is a net benefit from remittance flows and improved skills when they return home, or a net drain, given the financial and emotional costs of broken households and the loss of the skilled and professional group that is supposed to drive the transformation of the economy.

Calls to provide jobs for the potential emigrants or to appeal to their patriotism will have little impact in the short run. Is this emigration simply a phenomenon of the times and we must let it run its course even as we struggle to achieve significant and sustainable economic growth? On the other hand, should the Government recognise it as an issue and develop policies that will allow Jamaica to get a better outcome from this option of emigration that so many of our professional workforce now prefer?

There is no easy and widely acceptable answer to these questions, and one suspects that in the case of emigration, we have to push in both directions simultaneously, i.e., push in the direction of finding ways to keep our professional workforce at home and push to maximise the benefits from the inevitable outflow.

Clearly, this is an area that needs study and debate and if intervention by the State is thought necessary, it should not be viewed as a reflection of the longer-run goals or permanent policies of the Government. The issues after all are not unique to Jamaica. The World Bank, for example, reported that in 2005, "migrant workers from Latin American and the Caribbean sent a total of US$48.3billion back to their home countries, and this represented about 70 per cent of foreign direct investment into the region and was 500 per cent larger than Official Development Assistance to the region".

Child-support programme

I believe, however, that there are a number of actions that can and should be taken immediately. Chief among these is the requirement to develop a sophisticated child-support programme for those who emigrate with children left behind in Jamaica. This is not a voluntary remittance matter. Remember the magnitude of the problem as estimated by CIDA - Caribbean emigration is among the highest in the world, and Jamaica is among the highest in the region. Our government must seek to engage the UK, the USA and Canada in particular, in developing efficient ways of enforcing child-support claims.

Our courts need to make child-support settlements that reflect the income of the earnings of the absent higher-paid parent or parents. Our emigration and immigration vigilance should include a concern for child-support cheats. Equally so, our social services need to work with the schools to monitor the degree and quality of home supervision.

It is interesting to note that the literature on the benefits that emigrants provide to their home country lists networking and the improved knowledge and skills of returning emigrants as more important than financial flows. Given the educational level of many of those who emigrate from Jamaica, it is vital that we maintain up-to-date information of these professionals. Businesses and government should be able to easily contact them for jobs, networking and to advise and be advised of investment opportunities.

Networking process

Government officials and senior businessmen when they travel may wish to meet with individuals of this group to allow the networking process to operate. It is not that the importance of our professionals abroad is not recognised, as there are now many forums that seek to provide channels for dialogue between the professional and skilled in the diaspora and those at home. It is the easy access when the need is recognised that is missing.

Anyone who goes to a Jamaican sporting or musical event in the USA, the UK or Canada comes away knowing that Jamaicans in the diaspora are committed to Jamaica. We must nurture this commitment and understand that for us at home, the goal is not simply remittances, but how best to work with that pool of talent that has been schooled in Jamaica and now makes its home and living abroad.

If well over 50 per cent of our best-trained people leave Jamaica, and will continue to do so for the next several years, we must accept that where they go is part of our economic space. It is economic space that we do not control, but which we must influence and continually assess. Guest-worker programmes have worked in agriculture and hospitality. Can and should we seek to broaden the concept to other areas? Equally so, can we use this base of our professionals abroad to help with attracting investment to Jamaica. As we call on our professionals abroad to fully participate in the development and growth of Jamaica, we must protect them from those among us who only wish to plunder and steal from them. It is their size, wealth and educational level that require us to single them out for nurture.

Dr Marshall Hall is a businessman and former CEO of Jamaica Producers Group. Feedback may be sent to columns@gleanerjm.com