The Caribbean is an incredibly important region when it comes to the global maritime industry. It makes up around 40% of the worldwide cruise market, and around 70% of global cargo vessels pass through the Caribbean Sea each year. The Caribbean's proximity to both the equator and the Panama Canal makes it a vital gateway between North and South and East and West.
Despite this strategic and economic importance, the Caribbean remains a collection of small developing states, with the region's poverty rate at around 30%, according to the United Nations. The region's development challenges are worsened by the lack of access to higher education among the region's youth. In order to help alleviate poverty in the Caribbean while harnessing its potential as a global maritime hub, Dr. Geneive Brown Metzger founded the American Caribbean Maritime Foundation (ACMF) in 2015. Headquartered in Boca Raton, Florida, the ACMF is a nonprofit organization dedicated to sponsoring academic scholarships and grants to aspiring Caribbean maritime professionals and seafarers.
Supported by some of the largest cruise and cargo companies in the world, the ACMF sends scholars to five prestigious academic institutions in the region: Caribbean Maritime University (CMU) in Jamaica; LJM Maritime Academy in The Bahamas; MatPal Marine Institute and Atlantic Alliance Maritime and Off-Shore Training Institute, both in Guyana; and the University of Trinidad and Tobago. At these institutions, scholars study for bachelor's degrees in marine transportation, marine engineering, logistics, port management, and various other fields related to the maritime industry.
According to Brown Metzger, it costs an average of $6,500 (not including boarding) for a scholar to obtain his or her degree. To date, ACMF has helped more than 200 students from nine Caribbean countries to obtain a better life for themselves and their families by enabling them to acquire maritime training and find work in the industry. For many of these students, they are the first in their families to finish college – a major step in breaking the cycle of generational poverty for many.
"I was able to make myself proud and my family proud by doing what no one else in my family has done – and that is to be the first one to get a college degree," says Shadeen Reid, an ACMF scholar who graduated with a BSc in Port Management from CMU in 2021. "We're making a step forward. We're about to end this generational poverty and make it better for others to come."
According to Brown Metzger, she once interacted with the president of a major operator of a cruise line. She told him that, despite the cruise company selling a 'Caribbean experience', there were no Caribbean officers amongst the ship's crew. With this challenge, major operators of cruise lines have agreed, and most of them are now in support of ACMF. To help graduates enter the maritime industry, the ACMF launched the Caribbean Maritime Career Exchange, the first maritime jobs board for Caribbean maritime professionals and workers. The jobs board is free to all users.
Every year, the ACMF holds The Anchor Awards, a black-tie fundraising gala event that recognizes individuals and organizations who have made invaluable contributions to the maritime industry while supporting ACMF's cause of uplifting Caribbean youth. The upcoming event in October will honor Laura Hodges Bethge, President of Celebrity Cruises, and Carlos Urriola, President of SSA International.
In the future, ACMF plans to expand its reach to more countries in the Caribbean, aiming to reach 12 by 2025. This includes supporting youth from Haiti, which is suffering from widespread poverty and social unrest. To achieve this, it would require significant additional funding via generous donations.
"We would love to support between 10 and 20 Haitian students by bringing them to Jamaica, providing them with boarding and tuition support so they can study for a maritime career," Brown Metzger says. "That's going to take around half a million dollars or more. Once they have their degree, they can go back and help their country."
Small though they may be, Caribbean nations understand that in order to grow their economies, they must attract foreign direct investment and are looking to Europe, the U.S., Asia and the Middle East to build these important strategic relationships. The ACMF aligns with these objectives and will be exploring opportunities with the ports in these regions.
Prior to founding ACMF, Brown Metzger served as Consul General for Jamaica to New York from 2008 to 2012, and she has around 40 years of experience spanning diplomacy, corporate communications, foreign trade consulting, and government and community affairs. Her inspiration to help Caribbean youth out of poverty came from her father, who came to the US from Jamaica to seek a better life for his family. Even though he was initially deported, he was able to return to the US and bring his wife and six children, who were all able to acquire a college education in the US and have gone on to be business owners and senior executives.
"I want to see a deepening of the relationship between the Caribbean and the United States, as well as work with more well-meaning people in the shipping industry," Brown Metzger says. "The Caribbean is deeply involved in the global maritime industry and can be even more influential. But, to do that, we need to lift up our young people via education. I believe the solution to poverty is not more money. It is knowledge."
