A recent study by Oxford Economics found that producers in The Bahamas lack a competitive advantage that would make export a feasible economic opportunity, and it added that imports from other Caribbean producers have been more successful in penetrating the Bahamian market for basic food items.
The study was prepared in conjunction with the Organization for Responsible Governance (ORG), and examined the country's current export situation.
The economic assessment found that both the agricultural and manufacturing sectors are declining in The Bahamas.
"This adds impetus to a drive to build them (the sectors) up, but also suggests that fundamentally different business conditions might need to be cultivated to reverse these trends," the study stated.
"Specifically, real value added in manufacturing declined 10 percent, and real value added in agriculture dropped 31 percent between 2011 and 2015."
It was pointed out that The Bahamas does not currently export agricultural or manufactured products in any significant quantity.
"The Bahamas' 2015 domestic export of goods (i.e. excluding both tourism and service exports and re-exports) totaled $224 million, of which 60 percent were chemicals, 28 percent were food and live animals (mostly lobster, crab, conch and coral), and 11 percent were crude minerals," the report cited.
The authors of the study sought to identify a range of constraints that have stopped the agriculture and manufacturing sectors from thriving. To do so, they interviewed business leaders in the respective sectors.
"These (constraints) include the small size of The Bahamas domestic market, high labor costs, high energy costs, high capital costs and difficulty obtaining work permits for foreign workers," the authors found.
"Many of these problems will resonate outside of these two sectors as well, but here we explore them with a focus on how agriculture and manufacturing might become growth industries of the future in The Bahamas."
But, the study noted that not all local exporters are faced with the same challenges as it relates to exporting outside of the jurisdiction.
"Several successful exporters to the United States were interviewed during this study. For example, Abaco Neem, of Marsh Harbour, is a small exporter of natural healthcare products," the report stated.
"Likewise, the Symonette Group reported recent expansion of agricultural exports to the U.S. These examples demonstrate that a few companies (often with a specialized situation) do find exporting to the United States a feasible strategy."
The study added that, "More typically, it was found that producers in The Bahamas lacked a clear competitive advantage or scale to make export feasible.
"In fact, it was often the case that basic food imports--even from other Caribbean nations--have successfully penetrated The Bahamas market."

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