Call to include Cuba, others in CARICOM

A University of the West Indies (UWI) Cave Hill Campus academic and researcher is urging the Caribbean Community’s (CARICOM) incoming Secretary General to re-establish the importance of CARICOM to the region’s people.

Dr Kai-Ann Skeete, a Trade Research Fellow at the Shridath Ramphal Centre for International Trade, Law, Policy & Services (SRC) at the Cave Hill Campus, contended that CARICOM’s “significance has been waning” for some time.

In a blog posting, Dr Skeete offered congratulations to Belizean, Dr Carla Barnett, who replaces Ambassador Dr Irwin La Rocque in August as the top executive
at the CARICOM Secretariat, based in Georgetown, Guyana.

Arguing that Barnett was a fitting choice for the regional post, the research fellow cautioned, however, that the tasks ahead for the diplomat were weighty, as the relevance of the regional institution was diminishing.

“[CARICOM] must not be seen as another random regional arrangement in the hemispheric spaghetti bowl,” she wrote.

Instead, Skeete said the new secretary general “must champion the utility of multilateralism” and ensure CARICOM’s coordinated approach and engagement within the other regional arrangements starting with the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS), the Organisation of American States (OAS), and the Association of Caribbean States (ACS), among others.

Moreover, Skeete added: “It is time that the region adopts a methodology that fixes the proverbial ‘low-hanging fruit’. Thus, the region has to look at simple but tangible solutions to increase intra-regional trade.”

In this connection, she called for increased efforts to expand CARICOM membership to include Dominican Republic, Cuba, Puerto Rico, and the Dutch Caribbean territories.

The SRC research fellow added: “Perhaps, the region could tackle the advancement of regional standards and the removal of outdated non-tariff measures which frustrate and prohibit the intra-regional movement of goods.

“Dr Barnett is already familiar with the high quality of Belizean exports and the pathways the Belizean government has taken to facilitate the exports of local oranges/fruit juice to nearly all regional manufacturers of juices and beverages.”

Equally important, Skeete challenged the top regional official to address the perennial issue of the movement of people, goods, and services across the region.

“As a Belizean, Dr Barnett knows firsthand, the struggles of regional transportation and the movement of goods and people especially the fact that to reach the closest CARICOM neighbour of Jamaica requires an in-transit trip through either Miami or Panama, sometimes with a layover.

“Dr Barnett becomes secretary general at a time when the region is battling the world’s most global and fatal epidemic and our best efforts at vaccine diplomacy have shown us that we will be unable to truly determine our recovery without access to vaccines from a developed partner.

“It is hoped that Dr Barnett is not merely a convener of meetings and a companion to the conference, but that she transforms the administrative position of the secretary general into a predominantly advisory, implementing role similar to that of the director-general of the OECS. (IMC1)