EDITORIAL: Hoping for a productive Summit
THIS week Caribbean Community Leaders will be meeting in Antigua and Barbuda for their 42nd Summit.
Like several in the past this is a summit with a difference in that it is coming at a time given the the events which continue to unfold globally and regionally.
The meeting according to a report from the Georgetown, Guyana based CARICOM Secretariat, will address several critical issues. These, the statement explained, will include economic development matters with food production and food security very high on the agenda.
In addition, the regional roaming charges which are aimed at enhancing the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) sector and the region’s relations with the international community and how that community has been interfacing with Caricom.
While these are all pertinent subjects and from the perspective of driving regional integration, one cannot help but remind that the two-day summit is taking place against the background of COVID-19 which has created enormous social and economic damage and setbacks in the Caribbean.
One year after that pandemic unfolded, the Caribbean has felt the impact of it. Some of its citizens have died after contracting the virus, others remained ill, a situation that has improved with the acquisition of vaccines to help to prevent the pandemic from spreading.
However, because of disruptions globally and in particular to the vital tourism industry Caribbean economies have taken a beating. Five of them registered double digit economic declines in 2020. The outlook for this year is somewhat better.
Getting these countries back on their feet will therefore depend to a large extent on what happens in Antigua and Barbuda this week.
It can be said that some of the subjects down for discussions this week are not new. Increasing regional food production and food security were around for a long time.
This time however, there has to be a more serious approach and understanding that the small island states of the Caribbean have to get with it.
We have to improve on our attempts to feed ourselves even recognising that everything that is consumed in the region cannot be provided by individual territories. But there has to be a larger focus.
The discussion on roaming charges to boost ICT promises to be very useful based on statements made continuously and where Caribbean leaders want to take their economies.
Barbados is among a number of them in the region pushing more ICT, digitising, and more technology to boost their economies in the new global environment. It is these which hold the keys to future economic growth, job creation and prosperity of citizens.
They were given wide publicity in a report penned by members making up a Commission on the Economy. The members demonstrated how important the report can be once deployed to move Caribbean economies ahead.
Other agenda items like a common CARICOM position on Tourism, the revival of regional air transportation post COVID, tax transparency and blacklisting and de-risking areas are vital.
Therefore this Summit must come up with deliverables and decisions which are workable and which can benefit Caribbean countries.
There is no more time to waste as recent evidence has shown that from the blacklisting and re-risking our countries are in a struggle to survive. Unity is our only hope.