(CARIFORUM Directorate, CARICOM Secretariat, Turkeyen, Greater Georgetown, Guyana) – As part of its efforts to deepen and strengthen wider Caribbean cooperation, the Caribbean Forum of African, Caribbean and Pacific States (CARIFORUM) will host a regional consultation to consider mechanisms to foster sustainable dialogue and strengthen political, economic and technical cooperation.
The event, scheduled for 16-17 July 2025 at the Caribbean Development Bank’s headquarters in Barbados, will bring together over fifty participants from CARIFORUM States, the French Caribbean Outermost Regions (FCORs) and the Overseas Countries and Territories (OCTs). Regional organisations, private sector and civil society representatives have also been invited.
The Consultation is taking place against the backdrop of significant developments since the last regional engagement in 2019. These include the recalibration of the Caribbean-European Union (EU) partnership via the Samoa Agreement, the radically different mechanisms for development assistance and BREXIT.
Director General of CARIFORUM, Ms. Alexis Downes-Amsterdam, indicated that the implications of those and other developments for wider Caribbean cooperation were considered at a CARIFORUM Consultation in September 2024.
Ms. Downes-Amsterdam affirms that this Consultation is timely since CARIFORUM is examining frameworks to guide the implementation of the Caribbean-EU Protocol under the Samoa Agreement and the Protocol addresses the relationship with the FCORs and the OCTs.
The opening of the Regional Consultation will include a feature address by the Honourable Mr. Kerrie Symmonds, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, Barbados.
The CARIFORUM Director General and representatives of the Chair of CARIFORUM, Dominica and the European Union Delegation in Barbados will also deliver remarks at the opening ceremony.
Funding for the consultation is provided by the EU under the 11th European Union Development Fund (EDF) Regional Technical Cooperation Facility: a regional initiative being implemented by the CARIFORUM Directorate to promote Wider Caribbean cooperation.
