The Caribbean Association of Industry and Commerce (CAIC) is looking for an overhaul by strategizing an integrated public-private partnership within Caricom in the slipstream of what has been described as the failed Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) between Cariforum and the European Union.
Vice President of CAIC, Rollin Bertrand, stated that “we are now seeking to resuscitate the organization bring back our membership, certainly get the message across to our membership that our voice is important because they can’t be formulating all of these trade policy agreements without private sector input and asking us now to go and trade within the umbrella of a trade agreement if we were not part of the formulation of the agreement.”
Bertrand stated at a media briefing held at the Private Sector Commission’s office yesterday on Waterloo Street that the various organs under Caricom are not equipped with the requisite mechanisms to adequately engage the private sector in a meaningful way. He said that this unfortunately was a