Business View Caribbean | December 2020

9 BUSINESS VIEW CARIBBEAN DECEMBER 2020 T he CARICOM Private Sector Organisation on Dec. 3 signed a Memorandum of Understanding with the Caribbean Community to cooperate on the full implementation of the CARICOM Single Market and Economy (CSME), regarded as the most viable platform for supporting the Region’s growth and development. The CPSO is the latest Associate Institution of CARICOM, having been so designated on the 29 October 2020. Its status is recognition of the need for more structured engagement between the Community and the Private Sector and Labour to achieve economic development and full realisation of regional integration. Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley, the Lead CARICOM PRIVATE SECTOR ORGANISATION AND CARIBBEAN COMMUNITY SIGN MOU TO SUPPORT REGIONAL GROWTH AND DEVELOPMENT Head of Government in the CARICOM Quasi- Cabinet for the CSME, laid the foundation for the CPSO’s formation at a meeting of regional private sector officials in Barbados in June 2019. The private sector representatives were subsequently invited, along with representatives of the regional labour movement, to the CARICOM Heads of Government Meeting in July 2019, at which they signalled that progress was being made towards the establishment of the regional body. They confirmed to the Heads of Government at their 31st Inter-sessional Meeting in Barbados in February 2020, that the CPSO had been established as a non-profit organisation with Headquarters in Barbados. The CARICOM Secretary-General, in congratulating the CPSO, said while the CARICOM Treaty provides the administrative framework to create the single market and economy, it is the regional stakeholders, such as the private sector who will give practical OPENING L INES CARICOM Secretary-General Ambassador Irwin LaRocque signed on behalf of the Community and Chairman Mr. Gervase Warner signed for the CPSO in the virtual ceremony.