(CARICOM Secretariat, Turkeyen, Greater Georgetown, Guyana) Caribbean Community (CARICOM) Secretary-General, His Excellency Edwin W. Carrington said a significant amount of work had to be done to bring Haiti on board the CARICOM Single Market and Economy (CSME).

The Haitian Parliament ratified the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas including the Single Market and Economy three weeks ago and this paved the way for its participation in the CSME. The final domestic legal requirement is the publication of the ratification in the country’s National Gazette. Haiti will also have to deposit its instruments of ratification with the CARICOM Secretariat.

At a press conference at the CARICOM Secretariat, Turkeyen, Georgetown, Guyana on Tuesday, 23 October, the Secretary General told representatives of the media that the Secretariat will have to mount field missions to Haiti to assess the work that must be done.

In-depth discussions on various aspects of the CSME with agencies and institutions such as the University of the West Indies (UWI), the establishment of institutional structures and dialogue with civil society were among the steps the Secretary-General identified towards CSME-readiness.

He cited the abolition of visa requirements for Haitians to enter other CARICOM member states as among the more challenging areas that must be undertaken. The matter was raised at the recently concluded Sixteenth Meeting of the Council for Human and Social Development (COHSOD). The Secretary General said that although there have been no reservations from other member states regarding the visa abolition for Haitians, there must be a practical consideration of the issue in the context of the free movement of skills, one of the pillars of the CSME.

There must be a realistic proposal, he pointed out, on how to deal with what could be a massive outflow to the rest of the Region from Haiti, which has a population of more than eight million. He added that there were many positive aspects of Haiti’s participation in the CSME, including its huge market.

“This is a new frontier opening up to us; there are tremendous challenges but also tremendous opportunities,” Secretary-General Carrington said.

He noted that during the last week while he was in Haiti to attend the Fifteenth Meeting of Ministers of CARIFORUM and re-open the CARICOM Representation Office, he detected a change of image, pattern and vision emanating from Haiti.

On Friday, 19 October 2007 the Community re-opened its Representation Office in Port-au-Prince, Haiti at a ceremony which was addressed by the Prime Minister of Haiti, the Honourable Jacques Edouard Alexis, the Secretary-General and Mr. Robert Denis, a representative of the Canadian High Commission.

The office, headed by a Director, Ambassador Earl Huntley of Saint Lucia, was reopened after a hiatus of three years with support from the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) which has donated Cdn$3M over three years. Counterpart funding will be provided by the Secretariat and the Government of Haiti.

Contact: piu@caricom.org