END OF YEAR STATEMENT BY THE OUTGOING CHAIRMAN OF THE CARIBBEAN COMMUNITY (CARICOM) HONOURABLE ROOSEVELT SKERRIT PRIME MINISTER OF THE COMMONWEALTH OF DOMINICA
Our Neighborhood made regular progress to advance our integration motion in 2023. A highpoint of the yr had been the joyous celebrations throughout the Neighborhood for the Golden Jubilee Anniversary of the signing of the unique Treaty of Chaguaramas. Below the theme, “50 Years Sturdy: A Stable Basis to Construct On,” we paused for reflection on the numerous seminal achievements since 1973 and recommitted to the imaginative and prescient of our Founding Fathers for a affluent, unified Neighborhood.
To additional this goal, at our forty fifth Common Assembly of the Convention of Heads of Authorities of CARICOM in Trinidad and Tobago in July, we took the pivotal choices to work in the direction of the free motion of all CARICOM nationals inside the Neighborhood and to advance measures to deliver the regional capital market into being, with applicable attendant amendments made to the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas.
Our 25 by 2025 meals safety initiative picked up tempo, with a number of Member States recording vital initiatives to cut back our meals import invoice, and advance meals and vitamin safety for our folks. Our flagship occasion, the Caribbean Week of Agriculture, held in The Bahamas in April, allowed centered engagement with the personal sector. A essential Memorandum of Understanding signed with the Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture will prioritise actions to fight meals and vitamin insecurity, and enhance the local weather resilience of agriculture within the Caribbean.
Regional safety was introduced into sharp focus as we navigated escalating threats to our borders. We continued strenuous efforts, together with by means of the interventions of the CARICOM-appointed Eminent Individuals Group (EPG), and worldwide advocacy, to seek out options to the multi-dimensional disaster in Haiti and for a return to peace and stability.
Up to now, 5 consultations with stakeholders have been undertaken, the final yielding a Framework Settlement to offer a transitional governance association to take the troubled nation to free and truthful elections. Stakeholders achieved consensus on a number of elements of the draft Framework and have agreed to proceed discussions. Efforts have been additional bolstered with the pledge of help from a number of Member States to the Multinational Safety Help (MNSS) mission which the UN Safety Council has accredited.
Our efforts to transition to renewable vitality and improve vitality effectivity had been bolstered with the supply of $20 million in funding from USAID to Caribbean corporations with monetary and technical help and enterprise growth companies, by means of the Caribbean Local weather Funding Program. A Prime Ministerial Sub-Committee (PMSC) on Local weather Change and the Local weather Finance Agenda, with the help of the related technical specialists and establishments, now gives coordination and oversight of the preparation for worldwide local weather change and local weather finance negotiations.
We continued to pursue focused regional and worldwide partnerships. A key final result of those interactions has been the opening of the CARICOM headquarters of the African Export-Import Financial institution (Afreximbank) in Barbados, to increase Africa-Caribbean commerce and funding relations in essential financial sectors.
The challenges and achievements of the previous yr have clearly indicated that appearing in live performance is our surest approach of creating the native, regional and worldwide impression that’s wanted to deepen the CARICOM integration motion. On this regard, I lengthen honest gratitude to my colleague Heads of Authorities, to leaders throughout the size and breadth of the Neighborhood, and to the employees members of the CARICOM Secretariat. Your contributions have helped to additional our mandate of a Caribbean Neighborhood of which we might be proud.
My fellow CARICOM residents, it’s with collective will and motion that we are going to obtain our purpose of a affluent, wholesome and secure “Neighborhood for All”. Allow us to recommit to pursuing that purpose within the coming yr.
Might you’ve got a cheerful and peaceable finish to 2023, and a New Yr of success and prosperity.
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