(FORTUNE Magazine) – After a decade of chill, Jamaica's economy seems to be thawing. Gross domestic product grew nearly 4% in 1986, the strongest showing in 15 years. Unemployment and inflation are down, investment from abroad is up, and the island nation's public debt as a percentage of GDP has fallen to 3.3%, its lowest level in 17 years. Says Prime Minister Edward Seaga: ''All the major economic indicators are moving in the right directions.'' Diversification helped start the warming trend. The bauxite industry, traditionally Jamaica's prime earner of foreign exchange, has rebounded somewhat. But bauxite prices remain depressed, and Seaga says Jamaica's production is unlikely ever to match the lofty levels of ten years back. He has combined pro-Western politics and a glossy advertising campaign to restore tourism, battered in the late 1970s by the radical regime of Seaga's predecessor, socialist Michael Manley. Jamaica culled $539 million from tourism in the 1986-87 season, $100 million more than the season before and enough to make tourism the country's top foreign exchange earner for the first time, ahead of bauxite. Seaga also moved successfully to expand agricultural and industrial exports, such as ethanol derived from sugar cane. Taking his cue from Margaret Thatcher, Seaga is executing the most ambitious program of privatization in the Caribbean. He has sold all or part of 30 government properties, including the country's largest commercial bank. Now on the block are 13 government-owned hotels.