Jamaica’s best natural export – Jamaica Observer

I can’t say that I like American football, but my son and my husband do. Frankly, whenever they try to explain, I just drop the subject. When the National Football League (NFL) season begins, they become obsessed with their teams heading to the Super Bowl. Before we get off topic, let me say up front that this is not about the game of American football. On the contrary, it’s about Jamaica picking the winner.

So please give me just five more minutes of your reading time.

The NFL season in the United States runs from September to February each year. At the beginning of the season, games are played on Monday and Thursday nights and most Sundays until teams are eliminated.

Now here’s the exciting part. Billionaires buy football teams to make money. How do they make money? From ticket sales and television rights to all the games their team plays. Often these games can be watched on mainstream American television sports channels. But lately, on a Thursday night, fans of the game have to pay to view their team on a streaming site unless they’re already subscribed. Amazon Prime.

Amazon It paid the NFL US$11 billion for the rights to exclusively screen 198 games over 11 weeks. Amazon Prime every Thursday night. That’s $55.55 million per game.

The global media and entertainment market is US$2.8 trillion. Media and entertainment in the United States is worth $649 billion, according to the Department of Commerce.

Jamaica needs to tap into its global cultural potential.

In this column in April 2021, I pointed out how digital innovations are radically changing our physical world. Record stores have disappeared with the advent of music streaming, which accounts for more than half of total global recorded revenue. Replaced encyclopedias
GoogleNewspapers have been repositioned online within social media spaces, and streaming services have enabled constant access to an unlimited supply of video content.

It took 7 years for the internet to reach 100 million people; Instagram, 2.5 years; TikTok, 9 months; And ChatGPT, only two months.

users today YouTube — the world’s largest online video platform — a total of one-third of the world’s population watches one billion hours of content a day and uploads 500 hours of material every minute. That’s a lot of content consumption. Also, with the popularity of sites like Netflix, HuluAnd Amazon PrimeThe size of the global streaming market, worth US$ 342 billion, is projected to reach US$ 843 billion by 2027.

There are two useful truths in the digital world: International business is uncomplicated and content proliferation is constant. What content will Jamaica develop to sell to our digital world?

Reggae music is known worldwide. But what if someone, or our Government, had the foresight to trademark the name reggae 50 years ago? Can you imagine copyrights today?

The United Nations has recognized the potential of creative industries to “support countries whose economies are in transition to diversify production and exports…” (United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD)). The contribution of arts and culture to the US gross domestic product (GDP) is valued at US$804 billion, exceeding construction, transportation, warehousing, travel and tourism, mining and mining, agriculture, forestry, and fishing (US Bureau of Economic Analysis, 2016) . This represents a per capita income of $2,436; Based on Jamaica’s population, this figure would be US$7.3 billion.

For now, let’s set our goal at one-tenth of the per capita income of the United States. In other words, the potential value of our culture as an industry could be $731 million. At least two percent of this value ($14.6 million) should be allocated annually to the Ministry of Culture for the development of creative industries. A review of the 2021-2022 Jamaican budget reveals that $178.4 million or $1.23 million was spent on the creation and promotion of this area; that’s one-tenth of the allocation needed to be effective.

Over the years, successive governments have viewed our culture as a period of temporary activities aimed at making our people feel good, but not as a serious industry in need of incentives that could significantly grow our economy. This lack of vision to truly value the potential of our rich culture hinders our economic sustainability in a digital world that has become dependent on entertainment and learning content. Our raw talent alone is not enough to monetize our cultural impact on the world. We need a structured plan to get us there.

Jamaica’s enviable gold medal record in athletics is a direct result of the infrastructure put in place for the training and development of our athletes. Inter Secondary School Sports Association (ISSA), Boys’ and Girls’ Champs, GC Foster College for Physical Education and Sport and Carifta Games are some of the key platforms we use to identify, train and develop our children’s talents. athletes who will be on the world stage. We do not have such an infrastructure for music, theatre, visual arts and other creative industries. Our last significant investments in cultural performance spaces occurred in 1912 and 1958; only with The Ward and Little Theater in the Corporate Area. But we still continue to boast of being a “cultural superstate”.

The rhythm of the way we do things as Jamaicans makes our culture highly sought after. Our goal over the next five years should be to transform our island into a mega performance stage for professionally produced Jamaican talent and lifestyle content and create a Jamaican channel via satellite accessible to the world. The rental cost of time spent on the satellite is the easy part; Since viewers currently have hundreds of channels to choose from, the challenge will be to develop a steady supply of quality content to remain relevant.

We are a nation with a proud history of creative people. Our Miss Lou has been called the queen of Jamaican theater for over 50 years. Although our population is less than 3 million, we are known worldwide for our contributions to music and sports. Spice has a feature instagram Over 4.5 million followers and over 7 million Shenseea have achieved it all on their own, with little or no Government support in kind or policy.

The latest Taylor Swift tour and related revenue will earn her as much as US$4.1 billion (Washington Post), more than 4.5 times Jamaica’s national budget.

1.2 billion people live on the African continent, the majority of whom are black. Less than 10 percent currently have access to a smartphone. It is predicted that 90 percent of the population will have a smartphone in less than five years. What will they need? Contents!

Blind optimism is not a good model for economic success. Jamaica must position itself as a leading provider of this content and realize the potential of our greatest export: the talent of our people.

Lisa Hanna is the Member of Parliament for St Ann South East, the People’s National Party’s foreign affairs and foreign trade spokesperson, and a former Cabinet member.