An Education Needs Assessment of CARIFORUM Firms

Figure 1: Population below national poverty line, unemployment rate and youth unemployment in the Caribbean

Source: OECD 2019b

The region’s demographic trends point towards an increasingly ageing population. The Caribbean

has the highest age dependency ratio in the world, with one- quarter of the region’s population

expected to be over 60 and closer to 80 years old by 2050 (Caribbean Council 2022). This, coupled

with the region’s high net outward migration , creates implications for shortages of qualified labour.

One study estimated that, on average, 43% of secondary educated and 73% of tertiary education

Caribbean workforce migrated to OECD countries (mainly USA, Canada, and Europe) (Dohnert

et al. 2016; Wenner 2016; Al Hassan et al. 2020). Consequently, critical sectors are increasingly

losing talent, especially those with greater mobility, like nursing, allied health, teaching, and

engineering professions (OECD 2019b). The main push factors encouraging outward migration of

the region’s talent include insufficient training and opportunities for career progression, underuse

of skills, remuneration and benefits not equivalent to qualifications, and in some cases, poor

working conditions (ECLAC 2018; OECD 2019b; Compete Caribbean 2015).

Al Hassan et al. (2020) found that greater intraregional labour mobility across CARICOM could

boost the Caribbean’s productivity by keeping high -skilled labour in the region and limiting brain

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