Reflecting on next week’s WTO and CARICOM conferences
NEXT WEEK will see the CARICOM Secretariat and its member states attending t wo i mportant meetings – its own 46th CARICOM Heads of Government Conference to be held in Guyana, February 25-28; and the 13th Ministerial Conference (MC13) of the World Trade Organization (WTO) to be held in the United Arab Emirates, February 26-29.
Added to this, Jamaica will be having local government elections on Monday, February 26. This means that Prime Minister Andrew Holness, leader of the Jamaica Labour Party (JLP), will be unlikely to attend the CARICOM Heads Conference. This further means that the delegation will be led, as is customary, by the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, Senator Kamina Johnson Smith. In this case, Senator Johnson Smith will be unable to attend the WTO’s MC13.
WTO MC13
As the dates for the CARICOM Heads and the WTO MC13 coincide, this raises the question of which CARICOM foreign trade ministers will be attending. Guyana continues to be the lead minister on WTO matters. I note from a Guyana press release that the CARICOM Caucus of Ministers met on February 7 under the chairmanship of Guyana’s Minister of Foreign Affairs and International
Cooperation, Hugh Hilton Todd, to prepare for MC13, which meant determining the ministerial representation and coordination of positions.
It is understood that Guyana will be attending at the ministerial level as will several other CARICOM member states. So, CARICOM will have high-level representation at this meeting. I think that the lesson has been learnt from the 2001 Doha Ministerial Conference (MC4) that CARICOM should not attend a WTO conference without ministerial representation.
As mentioned in my article last week, CARICOM will also be coordinating with the Organization of African, Caribbean and Pacific States (OACPS).
I addressed the issues to be considered at t he WTO Conference i n my article of February 7 titled ‘ WTO 13th Ministerial Conference (MC13): Can results be delivered?’. The WTO Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies requires two-thirds of the full membership of 164 to enter into force, which is 123. Currently, just about 61 members, including the European Union (EU) members, have accepted the agreement, with only four CARICOM members – Barbados, Belize, Dominica and St Lucia. This would be one of the deliverables from MC13. CARICOM will also want to come away from MC13 with a decision related t o concerns of Small Vulnerable Economies.
Positive outcomes on trade
would be important to stimulate global economic growth. The WTO director general is going into this meeting with her fingers tightly crossed behind her back.
CARICOM HEADS
In the lead-up to the Heads Conference, it is reported that Dr Keith Rowley, prime minister of Trinidad and Tobago, is already in Guyana to attend that country’s Energy Conference and Supply Expo, February 19-22. This is now an annual conference, with this year’s
theme ‘Fueling Transformation and Modernization’ which, it is stated, is aimed at facilitating the exchange of ideas, propositions, and plans for fundamental advances in the energy sector.
Participating companies will also be tackling important concerns affecting the energy sector, as well as challenges of climate change mitigation and maximising the benefits of local content development in Guyana and the region. I assume other CARICOM countries are attending at some level, including Jamaica.
Guyana is the chair of CARICOM – President Dr Mohamed Irfaan Ali, up to June, and thus is the host and chair of this 46th Conference of Heads, February 25-28.
Following on from previous conferences, important issues on the agenda will include CSME implementation (free movement of people by March and the regional capital market by July), food security (the 25 per cent by 2025 initiative), energy security, climate change, Haiti and the
Guyana/Venezuela border controversy.
The CARICOM heads should also be discussing the developments in the Middle East, the ongoing situation i n Ukraine, and the upcoming elections in the USA. The continuing global crises are increasingly cause for concern as they impact the economy.
The special guest at this session is President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva of Brazil. This is an important guest due to the border issue and the situation of the BRICS, of which Brazil was a founding member.
I am interested in hearing what real progress has been made in CSME implementation. Are CARICOM members actually poised to implement free movement for nationals by the end of March? Are other timelines being met?
To make an advanced assessment, one has to know what work is actually being done in organs such as the CARICOM Council for Trade and Economic Development (COTED), which last met i n November 2023. The problem here is that there is never an outcome document from COTED, which would enable the media and others in civil society following these issues to gain an i dea of progress. More transparency is needed regarding CSME issues. We are left to assume that not much is actually being achieved despite the pronouncements.
So, apart from the local government elections here, there are regional and international meetings to monitor.