BARBADOS – Chairman of the Caribbean Community, the Rt. Honourable Owen Arthur wants corrective mechanisms to be implemented to curtail any inequitable distribution of the benefits of the Caribbean Single Market and Economy (CSME).
In delivering his keynote address at the Twenty-Eighth Meeting of the Conference of Heads of Government of the Caribbean Community, in Barbados, July 1-4 2007, Chairman Arthur said the establishment of the CSME has brought with it, attendant challenges, which have to be addressed expeditiously.
One, is the anomalies in the movement of skills across the Region. The Chairman said that although over 4000 skill certificates had been issued to support the movement of skills, there was “a very uneven concentration, across countries, suggesting that only a few countries are carrying the weight of providing a market for the workers of the Region.”
“In the absence of corrective mechanisms, these asymmetries in the distribution of the benefits from integration will only worsen,” he stated.
The CARICOM Chairman also raised the issue of transfer of social benefits, noting that although the CSME confers economic rights on the citizens of the Community to seek and hold employment in countries other than those of their nationality, it has not accounted fully for the social rights and entitlement of citizen’s access to social and welfare services as they move from one country to the other.
He further pointed to his concern that there were countries that are members of the Community but do not participate in the CSME.
To address this issue, Mr Arthur is recommending “a program of integration outside and beyond the mere economic sphere, addressing fundamental quality of life issues in respect of education, health care, the protection of our environment, technological development, transportation, security, support for marginalized groups, cooperation in the fight against poverty and towards the achievement of the Millennium Development goals as a collective regional exercise that could benefit both CSME and non-CSME members of our Community.”
