Opinion
CARICOM member states should bargain collectively for better terms and deals in addition to trade
This matter was raised with U.S. President Barack Obama at the Summit of the Americas in Panama by Antigua & Barbuda Prime Minister, Gaston Browne, last April. President Obama promised to look into the issue. But, again, joint CARICOM action on a regular and sustained basis is necessary if this serious problem, shared by all member countries, is not to simply fade from the U.S. agenda to the detriment of the region.
CARICOM has been at its best in delivering benefits for its peoples when its member states have acted together purposefully and with sound arguments backed up by empirical evidence. When CARICOM has done so, it has demonstrated that the measure of the integration project’s success is not only intra-regional trade, but collective bargaining for economic justice as well.
The same approach is needed to rectify the non-delivery to the Caribbean of the Economic Partnership Agreement with the European Union, the protestations of its representatives notwithstanding.
Ronald Sanders is an Antigua & Barbuda Ambassador and Senior Fellow at the Institute of Commonwealth Studies, which includes London University and Massey College – University of Toronto. He is presently a candidate for the post of Commonwealth Secretary-General.
