Barbados

The island was uninhabited when first settled by the British in 1627. Slaves worked the sugar plantations established on the island until 1834 when slavery was abolished. The economy remained heavily dependent on sugar, rum, and molasses production through most of the 20th century. The gradual introduction of social and political reforms in the 1940s and 1950s led to complete independence from the UK in 1966. In the 1990s, tourism and manufacturing surpassed the sugar industry in economic importance.

Economical characteristics

• Currency: Barbadian dollar (ISO code: BBD)
• Central bank discount rate: 10% (31 December 2008)
• Commercial banks lending rate: 10.03% (31 December 2008)
• Stock of money (M1): $1.637 billion (31 December 2008)
• Quasi money (with M1 makes M2): $3.701 billion (31 December 2008)

Statistics

Statistic / Year	1999	2000	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	2008
GDP (million USD)	2 468	2 559	2 548	2 476	2 694	2 824	3 005	3 191	3 409	3 682
Govt. debt (% of GDP)									91.625
Govt. revenue (% of GDP)									37.099
Govt. expenses (% of GDP)									40.114
Debt to revenue (years)									2.470

References

Note: statistical data was rounded. Different sources may use different methodologies for their estimates. Debt to revenue is calculated by dividing the two variables from their original ('unrounded') values. It represents how long it would a government take to repay its entire debt if it used its whole revenue for this purpose.

External links

• Barbados on Wikipedia
• Central bank of Barbados
• BBC country profile