Regional Roaming charges in focus

NEGOTIATIONS on roaming charges across Barbados and the Caribbean are to begin in earnest today as CARICOM moves to implement some of the proposals outlined in the report on Commission on the economy.

Chairman of the Commission, Professor Avinash Persaud said so during a panel discussion titled “Putting People in the Caribbean at the Centre of Development,” while focusing on the Commission’s report.

Dr. Damien King of the University of the West Indies, Jamaica, and Dr. Jan Yves Remy, Deputy Director of the Shridath Ramphal Centre, were the other panellists.

Caribbean countries have concluded agreements on key issues at their annual summits only to procrastinate in implementing them.

However, Professor Persaud said that since the report was done he has started to see some movements towards implementation.

“On Monday (today) there is going to be negotiations with the major telecommunications companies in the region to try and reach a negotiated agreement on one of the recommendations in the report dealing with data roaming charges,” Professor Persaud said.

He said that this can either be a flat data roaming charge for any CARICOM citizen moving around the region or there is no roaming charge and they are paying as if they were in their own country.

In addition, he said that personnel were already drafting what subsidiarity enhanced cooperation means to be presented at a CARICOM heads of Government conference later in the year.

He remarked further that there has been business discussions on a proposed fast ferry service by a handful of countries on how goods can be moved around the region and to get people to use the system by taking their cars to other regional countries where they can drive around before returning home.

The Chairman told the discussion discussions have taken place as well about the greater mobility of people. According to him, CARICOM heads of government are very much about lowering the threshold with respect to documentation like an individual having at least two CXC certificates, or does one need to queue to acquire it, to make the individual eligible for mobility across the region.

“So there is a fair amount of movement on a number of issues in the report,” Professor Persaud said noting that there is still a lot of scepticism about integration in the caribbean since the region has not delivered.