ST. GEORGE�S (IPS)�While many of their Latin American neighbors have been counting severe losses following the onset of the Asian Crisis in 1997, countries of the Commonwealth Caribbean have, in the countdown to the year 2000, been licking economic wounds attributable to somewhat different, but just as disastrous circumstances.

The crisis, accompanied by bad weather and indifferent world trading trends, delivered heavy punches to Latin America�s economies last year reducing a 5.4 percent growth average in 1997 to 2.3 percent by the time the figures were tabulated earlier this year.

Even as Prime Minister Keith Mitchell has been painting a fairly rosy picture here, with economic growth expected to reach close to 6 percent over the course of 1999, it is not a scenario other members of the Caribbean Community family can easily relate to.

Barbados � long considered to be among the more stable economies in the region � is in the throes of an economic slowdown that threatens to erase the after-glow of a massive Barbados Labor Party victory at the polls in January.

All important tourism figures have declined for the first time in four years forcing projected growth figures downward and prompting acting Central Bank Governor Marion Williams to publicly express some concern.

In a recent quarterly report to parliament, Mr. Williams pointed to a $6.5 million increase in foreign reserves over the first quarter saying an expected increase in 1999 "will result entirely from government borrowing on the regional capital market".

Growth in the island�s manufacturing sector has slowed, while the construction sector has seen decline from 20.7 percent in the first quarter of last year to 4.5 percent over the same period this year.

It is a condition Jamaicans can easily associate with, the island�s economy has experienced, on average, negative growth of 1.7 percent over the last 26 years.

Over the past two years more than 50 financial institutions have scaled down their operations, closed their doors or have been taken over by the government, as they were no longer thought to be viable

The manufacturing sector is also in decline following the closure of several garment factories over the last year.

"The challenge facing all of us as Jamaicans is the generation of economic growth," Delano Franklyn, an advisor to Prime Minister Percival Patterson wrote recently.

The political antecedents to economic growth are however nowhere as stark as in Guyana whose recently sworn-in 35-year-old president is charged with reversing a decline that has accompanied persistent political strife.

Bharrat Jagdeo, whose ascent to leadership came just weeks ago following the resignation of Janet Jagan for health reasons, is presiding over an economy that has seen dramatic gains at the turn of the decade turn to ashes at the turn of the century.

Guyana�s economy declined last year following average annual growth of 7.1 percent since 1990. The decline was attributed to a combination of deteriorating terms of trade, drought caused by the El Nino weather phenomenon and civil unrest, which followed general elections in December 1997.

A survey of the region�s economic performance by the United Nations Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC) suggested that for most countries of the Latin American and Caribbean region, "prospects for (fiscal imbalances in) 1999 do not permit hope for improvement."

It is not the kind of news economies of the Caribbean, diverse as they are, welcome willingly and some complain that the conditions for positive change simply do not exist.