Gail Alexan­der

T&T yes­ter­day ex­pressed sol­i­dar­i­ty with var­i­ous coun­tries in the re­gion that are deal­ing with huge spikes in COVID-19 in­fec­tions and re­lat­ed hos­pi­tal­i­sa­tions.

This was con­firmed by For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs Min­is­ter Amery Browne who spoke briefly as a sub-com­mit­tee of re­gion­al rep­re­sen­ta­tives met to dis­cuss Cari­com’s Sin­gle Mar­ket and Econ­o­my (CSME). The meet­ing was a cur­tain-rais­er for Cari­com’s 32nd In­ter­s­es­sion­al meet­ing which takes place to­mor­row and Thurs­day where the CSME will be among top­ics for dis­cus­sion. Prime Min­is­ter Dr Kei­th Row­ley is the cur­rent Cari­com chair­man.

Cari­com com­mu­ni­ca­tion head Leonard Robert­son said the sub-com­mit­tee meet­ing will dis­cuss the CSME to present rec­om­men­da­tions at the lead­ers’ meet­ing to­mor­row.

The CSME, Cari­com’s trade and eco­nom­ic mech­a­nism, cov­ers free move­ment of na­tion­als across the re­gion in health care, fi­nan­cial ser­vices, trans­porta­tion and com­mu­ni­ca­tions, tourism, ed­u­ca­tion, busi­ness, pro­duc­tion-re­lat­ed and en­vi­ron­men­tal ser­vices.

Cari­com re­cent­ly in­di­cat­ed that the COVID-19 pan­dem­ic will be a key in­ter­s­es­sion­al top­ic, in­clud­ing the re­gion’s on­go­ing ef­forts to deal with neg­a­tive so­cial and eco­nom­ic ef­fects on coun­tries caused by the virus. Dis­cus­sions are ex­pect­ed to fo­cus on a re­cov­ery path away from the pan­dem­ic’s ef­fects.

In that con­text, the CSME has been seen as a sol­id plat­form. Cari­com has stat­ed that col­lab­o­ra­tion among mem­bers, re­gion­al in­sti­tu­tions and the group­ing’s sec­re­tari­at “which proved so ef­fec­tive in the com­mu­ni­ty’s rel­a­tive­ly suc­cess­ful con­tain­ment of the virus, is an­oth­er fac­tor in our favour.”

Yes­ter­day’s CSME sub-com­mit­tee meet­ing was to have been chaired by Prime Min­is­ter Row­ley. T&T’s del­e­ga­tion at the meet­ing in­clud­ed Trade Min­is­ter Paula Gopee-Scoon, For­eign and Cari­com Af­fairs Min­is­ter Browne, his min­istry’s per­ma­nent sec­re­tary and T&T’s am­bas­sador to Cari­com.

Browne, who is lead­ing T&T’s del­e­ga­tion, said: “We re­it­er­at­ed our na­tion’s com­mit­ment to the full im­ple­men­ta­tion of the CSME through fur­ther amend­ments to leg­isla­tive, a pro­gramme to dig­i­tize the skills cer­tifi­cate ap­pli­ca­tion process and mea­sures to in­crease pub­lic aware­ness of the ben­e­fits and im­pli­ca­tions of the free move­ment regime.

Browne said the is­sue of COVID vac­cines, shar­ing and oth­er­wise, were not for yes­ter­day’s meet­ing.

“COVID spe­cif­ic mat­ters will be dis­cussed (to­mor­row) and Thurs­day,” he said

In re­cent years, T&T un­der Row­ley has pushed for the CSME to be made a front burn­er mech­a­nism and fur­thered in Cari­com’s agen­da.

Oth­er Cari­com sources in­di­cat­ed that lead­ers’ up­com­ing dis­cus­sions on the CSME may not be lim­it­ed to its sta­tus and progress, the ques­tion of ex­pan­sion and pos­si­bly any in­put in the COVID fight. They couldn’t con­firm if talks might ex­tend to whether the CSME can aid in the re­gion’s push for vac­cines.

But the two-day in­ter­s­es­sion­al will be ex­am­in­ing a joint tourism plan and oth­er is­sues. Oth­er ar­eas ex­pect­ed to get at­ten­tion are the ef­fects of the glob­al econ­o­my on the re­gion, fi­nan­cial is­sues, se­cu­ri­ty, hu­man traf­fick­ing, mi­grants and the Guyana-Venezuela mar­itime bor­der is­sue.