The Council for Human and Social Development (COHSOD), an Organ of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), will examine proposals aimed at refashioning the Region’s 1997 human resource development strategy as it places emphasis on human capital development in the Community at its Fifth Meeting in Georgetown, Guyana.
The Meeting gets underway at the Le Meridien, Pegasus, on 3 October 2001, considering as its first agenda item in plenary, the framework which was set by the Conference of Heads of Government at its Eighteenth Meeting in 1997 to inform decisions and programmes on Human Resource Development. The Community Organ is mobilising new perspectives on the content and process towards the development of the Region’s Human Resource. A collaborative effort involving the CARICOM Secretariat and the academic and policy institutions as well as the public and private sector agencies is being mounted to chart the new course.
The three-day deliberations of COHSOD V will also look at gender issues, “a cross-cutting element in Human Resource Development” as well as the reduction of the demand for illicit drugs, evaluating its implications for human resource development. Recommendations are expected to be tabled at this forum relating to drug abuse and security matters, which ranks high among public concerns across the Region. Culture, Youth and Sport issues are other matters that will go before the forum.
The Nassau Declaration on Health 2001 and the Pan Caribbean Partnership on HIV/AIDS, which earlier engaged the attention of the supreme organ of the Community, the Conference, have been identified for follow-up action by COHSOD.V.
Officials will be pushing ahead with a mandate from the Conference relating to the facilitation of travel and the movement of skills and services providers within the Region. The critical areas to be discussed include the establishment of common standards and measures for accreditation, and coordination of legislative and administrative requirements for the conduct of non-wage-earning activities within the Community.
In addition to the working sessions in which Member States will be represented at Ministerial level, other highlights of the programme of activities of COHSOD V include public events. They will start with an open forum to address issues on HIV/AIDS under the theme “the Health of the Region is the Wealth of the Region” slated for Wednesday, 3 October 2001, at 4:30 p.m. This event will be followed by a Reception and launching of an Art Exhibition in the evening beginning at 7:30 p.m.
A symposium is also planned to deal with, “Caribbean Issues, Challenges and Responses from the World Conference against Racial Discrimination and Race Related Intolerance.” This is scheduled for 11:00 a.m. Thursday, 4 October, 2001.
