CARICOM Secretary General Mr. Edwin Carrington has announced that Suriname will soon become a member of the CARICOM-Canada Joint Trade and Economic Committee (JTEC). Mr Carrington was speaking on Thursday 19 February 1998 at the opening of the Ninth JTEC meeting in Georgetown Guyana at the CARICOM headquarters. Suriname which became a member of CARICOM in 1995 is expected shortly to take the final steps to complete its membership in JTEC.
In his brief remarks the Secretary General emphasised the special relationship between the Region and Canada and outlined the developments which has been taking place since the last JTEC meeting in November 1996.
“Subsequent developments dealing with some of these issues, for example the question of Landmines; Candidature for major international positions; and Haiti have justified our fate in this relationship” said Mr. Carrington. He made special mention of the CARICOM Regional Institution Strengthening Project (CRISP), designed to render strategic technical and financial assistance to the Caribbean Community’s development.
Mr Carrington said the “quality of co-operation we enjoy between Canada and CARICOM owes much to the quality of relationship between the Heads of Government of the countries involved. That those Heads of Government would have found it useful to meet three times in the last three years speaks volumes of the relationship and serves to anchor the institutional arrangements which the JTEC represents.”
The Ninth Meeting of JTEC will deal with the Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) which arose out of the first Summit of the Americas held in December 1996; the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) programming; Developments in CARICOM/ Institutional Reform; Political Issues, Security issues and Major Hemispheric meetings.
The meeting is being jointly chaired by Mr. Carrington and Mr. Michael Kergin, Assistant Deputy Minister, Americas Foreign Affairs and International Trade.
Mr. Kergin in his opening statement said the World Trade Organisation (WTO) ruling on the Banana issue, “unfortunately affected some of the Caribbean States which depend heavily on the bananas economically and financially”. He made mention of the effects of Global Warming; the situation in Montserrat; and the admission of Haiti to CARICOM.
The CARICOM delegation includes the High Commissioners to Canada from The Bahamas, Barbados, Jamaica and Trinidad and Tobago and representatives from Guyana, St. Lucia, St. Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) and Caribbean Export Development Agency (CEDA).
The Canadian delegation includes Mr. Stephen Free, Director, Americas Branch, Canadian International Development Agency, Mr. Simon Wade, Director, Caribbean and Central America Division, Foreign Affairs and International Trade (former High Commissioner to Guyana). The Canadian High Commissioners to Guyana, Jamaica, Barbados, the OECS countries and Trinidad and Tobago are also part of the Canadian delegation.
