KINGSTON, Jamaica – JAMAICANS are an endangered species at the UN Secretariat housed in New York in the United States.
Of the roughly 43,000 people employed there, only 136 are Jamaican. Of that number, only 28 fall within the professional category, with “very few” in senior-level posts.
“Jamaicans, therefore, remain underrepresented at the senior levels within the United Nations. Further, as at June 30, 2013 Jamaica's representation status across the board was classified as being at risk of being underrepresented,” permanent secretary in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade Ambassador Paul Robotham told a small group of journalists at the ministry's Dominica Drive offices in Kingston yesterday morning.
