(CARICOM Secretariat, Turkeyen, Greater Georgetown, Guyana) The Director-General of the Caribbean Forum of African, Caribbean and Pacific States (CARIFORUM) Directorate in the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) Secretariat, Mr Ivan Ogando Lora, has described the CARIFORUM-EU Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) as “one of the most ambitious contemporary attempts at promoting regional integration processes.”
Mr Ogando was at the time addressing a packed audience of business leaders, policy makers, officials and media at the opening of the Caribbean Export Development Agency-organized Caribbean Exporters’ Colloquium — 2013 being held at the Hilton Barbados in Bridgetown, Barbados from March 20 to 21. Amongst those gathered for the launching of this signature event were: Senator The Hon. Maxine McClean, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, Barbados; The Hon. Ryan Pinder, Minister of Financial Services, The Commonwealth of the Bahamas; The Hon. Anthony Hylton, Minister of Industry, Investment and Commerce, Jamaica; Sir Shridath Ramphal, Former Chairman, West Indian Commission; Ambassador Colin Murdoch, Chairman, Board of Directors of the Caribbean Export Development Agency; and Ms Pamela Coke-Hamilton, the Executive Director of the Caribbean Export Development Agency.
The Colloquium forms part of and is the capstone activity of the inaugural Caribbean Export Week, which runs from March 17 to 22 under the theme ‘Promoting Regional Trade, Export Development and Investment’.
The event provides an opportunity for a cross-section of key stakeholders to examine the status of the ‘regional export platform’. Ms Coke-Hamilton, has described the Colloquium as an important and timely opportunity to “reinitiate the conversation on export led growth and, against this backdrop, to re-examine the applicability and relevance of the recommendations emanating from the seminal ‘Time for Action’ Report tabled by the West Indian Commission (WIC) to the Heads of Government in 1992.” Speaking at the opening ceremony, Ms Coke-Hamilton said “the findings and recommendations of the ‘Time for Action’ Report are as applicable today as they were two decades ago.”
The agenda lends itself to facilitation of dialogue and exchange amongst participants and between participants and a varied set of panelists, comprising policy makers, trade policy practitioners and business persons, on the most effective ways in which the Region can seek to exponentially increase exports and achieve deeper market penetration in both traditional and non-traditional markets. “The intention is to identify and get consensus on the priority sectors that could be the focus of a viable regional export strategy,” Ambassador Murdoch noted.
The challenges and opportunities that arise with respect to the EPA will inform the deliberations over two days with a view to, as the Caribbean Export Development Agency has described it, ‘explore new instruments for enabling the regional private sector to take advantage of the Agreement.’
Instructively, Senator McClean put the onus for making the EPA work for the Region squarely at the feet of the regional private sector, underscoring in her feature address that, “As a Region, we must develop an export or die mentality.” In this regard she further stated, “Our business persons must be innovative in their thinking.
Senator McClean encouraged the gathering to focus attention on a regional export strategy, of which an action plan would form a critical part. Ms Coke-Hamilton also called attention to this point in her opening remarks.
The fifteen signatory Caribbean Forum of African, Caribbean and Pacific (CARIFORUM) States to the EPA are the independent CARICOM Member States and the Dominican Republic.
