Trelawny Parish

Trelawny hosts Falmouth, the Caribbean's best-preserved Georgian colonial town and Jamaica's largest cruise ship port, the harbor's depth accommodating vessels that Montego Bay and Ocho Rios cannot receive. This cruise infrastructure creates concentrated economic activity when ships dock—craft vendors, tour operators, and transportation services competing for passenger spending during limited port hours.

Sugar and rum production defined Trelawny's historical economy, the parish's plantations generating wealth that built Falmouth's Georgian architecture before emancipation transformed the labor system. This heritage provides tourism content—plantation tours, colonial architecture, Martha Brae River rafting—that diversifies beyond beach-focused offerings available elsewhere. The Hampden Estate rum distillery maintains artisanal production methods that premiumization trends reward.

The parish's economic duality—cruise tourism concentrated in Falmouth, agricultural interior producing sugar and citrus—creates spatial inequality where coastal prosperity bypasses inland communities. Whether Trelawny can integrate heritage tourism with agricultural livelihoods—or whether cruise ship economics continue concentrating benefits at the port—determines whether colonial-era patterns of coastal extraction versus interior production persist into post-colonial economy.