Background:
The island was uninhabited when first settled by the British in
1627. Slaves worked the sugar plantations established on the island
until 1834 when slavery was abolished. The economy remained heavily
dependent on sugar, rum, and molasses production through most of the
20th century. The gradual introduction of social and political
reforms in the 1940s and 1950s led to complete independence from the
UK in 1966. In the 1990s, tourism and manufacturing surpassed the
sugar industry in economic importance.