(BBC) The man spearheading a closer union of the Eastern Caribbean has taken another dig at what might be regarded as its parent.

Sir Dwight Venner has portrayed the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) as a more nimble organisation than the Caribbean Community (Caricom) in responding the current economic crisis.

Sir Dwight, the governor of the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank, is leading a task force preparing the OECS for an economic union that they hope to complete by the end of the year.

Caricom was established in 1973, eight years before the smaller OECS, which groups the Leeward and Windward Islands.

This Eastern Caribbean grouping has outstripped Caricom in the pace toward closer integration, having one currency and judiciary among common services.

While Caricom, in many critics view, has been caught napping by the financial crisis, the OECS has been more responsive, according to Sir Dwight.

“Quite rational”

He said: “In this region, the OECS countries have seen the most consolidation when it comes to the resolution of problems.

“In the broader Caricom, I don’t think they have that feel, in a sense, for what true integration means.

“In the OECS, for example, when we go to the table, there is always the spirit of compromise and the decisions taken are quite rational and the follow-up is very substantial, like what we have done this year.

Elaborating, he went on to say that the sub-grouping’s monetary council of finance ministers has met four times this year in special session, also with heads of government, and drawn up an eight-point plan to deal with the crisis.

Ministers in key sectors like tourism have also been meeting to draw up specific plans arising from that outline plan.

The OECS governments and business sector also reacted quickly when Allen Stanford’s Bank of Antigua was under threat by taking over its operations.

“What we’ve seen is the OECS institutions really coming to the fore in really serving the purpose for which they were established,” he said.

“We have shown that we have solutions for major issues within the current arrangements that we have and we have to build on that.”

Full meeting

That is one reason the OECS is pushing for an economic union, which is an expanded trade and customs union.

Finance ministers of member countries are holding another meeting on 19 May to be followed by a summit over the following two days.

Caricom leaders plan to meet in special session in on 24 May for their first full meeting dedicated to the financial and economic crisis.

The subject was discussed at their first quarter summit in Belize, but the meeting ended in generalities about recognition of the need for a regional approach to the downturn.

Critics rounded on the integration grouping, suggesting it was a lost opportunity.

Guyanese economist Clive Thomas described the Caricom response to the crisis as anaemic.

“It is as if it is not recognised that the financial meltdown represents a tipping point in the evolution of Caricom integration,” Dr Thomas wrote in the Stabroek News.

He noted that Caricom’s highest deliberative forum, the heads of government, did not meet as a group to debate the financial and economic downturn until the Belize meeting – six months after the crisis emerged.

Caricom has set up a task force of bankers and economists to come up with a range of responses to the crisis.

In Belize, the leaders had also agreed to collaborate on solutions to the shock to their financial systems caused by the crisis at the Trinidad-based CL Financial Group, which has extensive interests across the region.

Severe pressure

The fall-out from the    conglomerate’s problems, including a takeover of some assets by the Trinidad government, is still being felt in some Caricom member countries.

The downturn has hurt their economies in other ways. For example foreign exchange earning sectors, including tourism, mining and international business, are all under severe pressure.

Jamaica’s Prime Minister Bruce Golding told the meeting of foreign ministers that Caricom needed now more than ever its sense and strength of community to confront the current global crisis.

“It is so pervasive that those to whom we would normally turn for protection are busy trying to protect themselves,” he said. “