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Nassau and Freeport and their environs have modern paved roads, as do most of the inhabited islands. A fleet of small motor vessels carries passengers, freight, and mail weekly between Nassau and the Family Islands. Numerous foreign passenger and freight ships visit the two ports each year. The airplane has become of increasing importance to the Bahamian economy. Throughout the islands there are some 60 airports, with varying accommodations and facilities. Manufacturing industries include food-processing plants, petrochemical refinery and a pharmaceutical factory. Freeport has become the most important centre of industrial development and is second only to Nassau in tourist and commercial activity. In the mid-1980s, the Bahamas was classified as an upper middle-income developing country and ranked among the wealthiest nations in the Caribbean region. Tourism was the nation's primary economic activity. In order to lessen the economy's dependency on tourism, the government has followed a policy of diversification since the 1970s, emphasising development in the industrial and agricultural sectors. Despite various programs to boost production, the World Bank estimated that agriculture in the Bahamas accounted for less than 5 percent of GDP in 1986. Salt, rum, aragonite, and pharmaceuticals are produced, and these, along with animal products and chemicals, are the chief exports. The Bahamas also possess facilities for the transshipment of petroleum. country's main trading partners are the United States and Spain. |
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