(CARICOM Secretariat, Turkeyen, Greater Georgetown, Guyana) The Services Sector is to be shaped into a more structured one to derive maximum benefit and boost its already prominent position in the Region’s economy. To this end, a Regional Symposium on Services, proposed by the Hon. Baldwin Spencer, Prime Minister of Antigua and Barbuda, and Lead Head of Government with responsibility for Services, will be held in Antigua and Barbuda 15-17 July.
At a media briefing Thursday afternoon at his Office in St. John’s, Prime Minister Spencer said that given the importance of Services to the regional economy, the Community must plan for and provide the necessary support for its further growth and development. The Symposium, he said, provided the opportunity “for us to map the Community’s future in Services in a more structured way.”
The sector – which consists of sub-sectors including Tourism, Entertainment, Construction, Telecommunications and Financial Services – is the largest in the CARICOM Single Market and Economy (CSME) accounting for about two-thirds of employment, output and exports. Prime Minister Spencer told the Media that between 2005 and 2007, the Services Sector contributed US$20B or 64.8 per cent of the Region’s annual GDP that averaged about US$30B. In Antigua and Barbuda, the Sector contributed US$738.0M or 83.5 per cent of total GDP in 2007.
PM Spencer said the focus on Services at this juncture made sense, and that the sector had to maximize its potential in order to more effectively respond to the current global crises.
The Prime Minister had earlier received a briefing from Amb. Irwin LaRocque, Assistant Secretary General Trade and Economic Integration, CARICOM Secretariat who led a CARICOM Secretariat team to Antigua and Barbuda for the briefing. The team included Ms. Desiree Field-Ridley, Adviser, Single Market and Sectoral Programmes, and Mr. Timothy Odle, Deputy Programme Manager, Services.
The Prime Minister expressed satisfaction with the level of preparation that had been made so far.
The Symposium is aimed at sensitizing the key stakeholders in the sector on how to capitalize on the Region’s comparative advantage in the area of services for the further development of the Community. Other objectives are the development of a plan of action for the period 2009-2013/14 and providing concrete expression to the services component of the Single Economy Development Vision within the context of the Strategic Plan for Regional Development.
“The idea is to examine each of the services areas in some detail to flesh out what happened in the past, the current situation and how we anticipate we will handle things in the future,’ the Prime Minister said.
Participation in the Symposium will be drawn from industry specialists, owners and Chief Executive Officers of large, medium size and small firms operating in the sector, consumer representatives, internationally renowned services experts, senior members of the academic community in the Region, representatives of international organizations, and senior public sector officials.
The three-day event is being organized by the CARICOM Secretariat in association with the government of Antigua and Barbuda, the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) and the United Kingdom Department for International Development (DFID), and the Spanish Agency for International Cooperation for Development (AECID).
