Some years ago, when the banana wars were at their height, the issue for Europe was diversification. Then, the world was very different, the scope of what was possible was limited, and the services sector was not much thought about in Europe as the future economic driver for the Caribbean.
At the time I had a conversation with a senior figure in the European Commission who was responsible for determining European policy towards the region. What he told me in private was that he and many of his officials could not see any viable sector for the Caribbean to move into and away from bananas.
For me this did not make sense. Then and now the admittedly not complete answer was straightforward tourism and I said so. My interlocutor was polite, but in a northern European way was
