Regional leaders to discuss global trade issues today
Sun St Kitts/Nevis, St Kitts and Nevis
Regional leaders to discuss global trade issues today
by Peter Richards
3 July 2006
BASSETERRE, St. Kitts (CMC) - Jamaica’s Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller will chair the prime ministerial sub-committee on External Trade Negotiations today, according to a Caribbean Community (Caricom) Secretariat statement issued here yesterday.
It said that Simpson Miller, who will be attending her first Caricom Summit since replacing Prime Minister P.J. Patterson, will preside over the meeting where the leaders will be “brought up to date on the state of trade negotiations being conducted at the bi-lateral level between the Community and Canada, Mercusor, Dominican Republic and Cuba.”
It said that the meeting would also discuss the multilateral negotiations at the level of the World Trade Organisation (WTO) and the Economic Partnership Agreements with the European Union (EU).
Last week, Barbados Foreign Trade and Foreign Affairs Minister Dame Billie Miller was critical at the pace of the negotiations regarding the EPA, under which Europe would provide aid and financial assistance to the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) states.
The prime ministerial sub-committee meeting precedes the opening of the 27th Caricom Summit at which the Caricom Single Market and Economy (CSME) will be among the top agenda items.
Caricom Secretary General Edwin Carrington told the Caribbean Media Corporation (CMC) that the leaders would be paying attention to expanding the categories of skilled nationals eligible for free movement under the initiative that allows for the free movement of goods, skills, labour and services across the region.
