By Sir Ronald Sanders
It is a mistake to believe that the war in Iran and the retaliatory actions in the Gulf are too far away to matter to the Caribbean. The fallout is already reaching the region, pushing up the costs of fuel, freight, and everyday goods across the region. For import-dependent economies, this instability brings higher prices, greater fiscal strain, and added vulnerability for those least able to absorb shocks.
The Strait of Hormuz, the corridor through which roughly a fifth of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas passes, has become a pressure point for the global economy. “War risk” premiums for vessels have jumped to as much as 1 per cent of a ship’s value from about 0.2 per cent the week before; in some cases, underwriters are declining cover for Hormuz transits altogether.
The result is higher prices for everything that depends on predictable maritime trade. Energy prices respond quickly. On March 3, the global oil benchmark was up about 8 per cent to around US$84 a barrel. Some analysts expect Brent crude, the main international benchmark price for oil, to reach or exceed US$100 if the conflict continues.
Higher fuel costs feed into electricity generation, public transport, aviation, and the movement of food and consumer goods. When energy rises, the cost of living rises, most sharply for those with the least spare income. That is why the Caribbean is particularly exposed. The region’s dependence on imported energy and imported food turns external conflict into domestic inflation.
The Caribbean imports approximately USD 8.5 billion in food annually, so higher freight and fuel costs, coupled with disruption to global fertiliser supplies, quickly become higher prices at the till. Oil prices explain roughly 60 per cent of regional energy inflation, so households can see electricity and transport costs climb quickly.
Tourism, the main source of foreign exchange and employment for many states, is also at risk. If jet fuel rises and traveller sentiment weakens, the Caribbean’s 2026 tourism outlook becomes harder to sustain. The war has led to mass flight cancellations and closures: at least 11,000 flights to and from Middle Eastern countries were cancelled, affecting more than one million travellers.
Even airlines far from the conflict are vulnerable because fuel typically accounts for 15 to 25 per cent of a flight’s costs, and sustained oil spikes work their way into ticket prices and demand.
It is not difficult to see how this reaches the Caribbean: fewer travellers, higher fares, and tighter margins for hotels, restaurants, taxi operators, and the small businesses that rely on visitor spending.
Regret for war does not require silence about the Iranian regime. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei’s rule has long been associated with harsh repression in Iran: the denial of rights, arbitrary arrests and imprisonment, and the crushing of dissent. Women have been particular victims of enforced control and state violence. To acknowledge these truths is important, because many people will feel an understandable ambivalence: condemning a regime’s cruelty while fearing the wider consequences of escalation. One can hold both positions at once.
The United Nations also shows the constraints that arise when the Security Council cannot reach consensus. The Secretary-General, António Guterres, condemned the military escalation, called for an immediate cessation of hostilities and de-escalation, and urged all parties back to diplomacy. Yet the Security Council has remained divided and unable to agree on a unified response.
So, who wins and who loses? Israel’s Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, plainly presents the war as a strategic gain. For him, the Iranian regime has been a mortal enemy of Israel and a principal sponsor of regional hostility towards it. Whether this war reduces anti-Israeli sentiment, or fuels it further, remains to be seen. The United States administration has also cast the conflict as a success, particularly because of its concern about Iran’s capacity to develop nuclear weapons. At the same time, even where governments believe strategic objectives have been advanced, the imperative is to prevent further escalation, protect civilian life, and return to diplomacy that can bring the confrontation to an end.
The losers are the global public, particularly in import-dependent and debt-constrained states. Stock markets have stumbled, reflecting fears of inflation, disrupted trade, and recession risk. The losers are also those who are killed on all sides, especially innocent children. Consumers lose through higher prices for food, shipping and essentials, as higher oil costs bleed into nearly every sector. Governments lose fiscal space, pressured to cushion households through subsidies or tax relief at the very moment that import bills and interest costs threaten to widen deficits.
The winners are narrower. Energy producers and commodity traders often benefit from volatility and price spikes, at least in the short term. Defence contractors and munitions suppliers rarely suffer in wartime markets. Shipping and insurance can extract higher premiums from higher risk. Meanwhile, ordinary economies pay the price.
Even within the Caribbean, the distribution is uneven. Guyana is a notable outlier: higher oil and LNG prices can lift export earnings and the revenues of the licensed producers operating there. This is a market effect of the war, not an outcome that Guyana sought.
Amid all this, the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) has not yet spoken with a single voice, although the governments of Antigua and Barbuda, Guyana and Trinidad and Tobago have each made separate statements. The absence of a clear, joint CARICOM position projects hesitation when the region’s interests are directly implicated through energy prices, shipping risk and inflation. Antigua and Barbuda, for its part, has urged maximum restraint, an immediate de-escalation, and renewed diplomatic engagement under the rule of law, reflecting the kind of principled, measured stance the Community as a whole should now adopt.
Consensus is difficult when member states weigh different exposures and bilateral relationships. Some will fear offending major partners and provoking retaliation. But war anywhere undermines peace everywhere, and it punishes most severely those economies that rely on stable prices, open sea lanes, tourism confidence, and investment flows.
For the Caribbean, the proper response should be a clear-eyed defence of de-escalation, the rule of law, and protection of civilian life. CARICOM should, therefore, speak with one voice, not to assign blame or to posture, but to urge restraint, a return to diplomacy, and respect for the norms that protect small states as much as large ones. This would not be an attack on any state; it would simply be a call for good sense in the interest of all humanity, even as the war travels steadily to Caribbean shores.
