JERSEY IN 2020


WHAT’S GONE WRONG?


Sarah Hill, Editor, 20/20 Magazine


Looks at the prospects for Jersey as it progresses through the landmark year of 2020, featured in the title of this magazine.


The results make for uncomfortable reading. I


f you look back just over 20 years to the beginning of the millennium, you will wonder whether there has been any progress at all in the intervening period. The problems we faced then are very similar to the problems we face now, including the need for government reform, protection of the environment,


population control, an ageing society, an economy dangerously dependent on one industry, and increasing international hostility to a small island with big privileges.


About the only thing that has changed in more than two decades is that a certain amount of complacency has now crept in but despite these big challenges, Jersey will always come out on top. Unfortunately, some Islanders may be living in the past, and Jersey is going to need more than confident words from government ministers to avoid potential disaster.


Just about the only reason the Island continues to be in a strong position economically is because of the considerable financial reserves built up in the last quarter of the 20th century when the finance sector was making huge profits. Not even the most loyal of the finance industry’s supporters would believe now that another bonanza from finance is just around the corner, and most would admit that it will be increasingly difficult to retain the markets we have, let alone develop new ones. Although the finance sector will no doubt continue to be successful, finance is very unlikely to produce anywhere near the same levels of wealth created in the 1980s or the 1990s. In the absence of any suitable substitute, the Island’s standard of living is bound to suffer so, don’t look now, but Jersey’s golden age of economic growth and prosperity could be coming to an end. How quickly, will partly depend on how long last century’s reserves hold up.


Smart Island Page 51


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