Mr. Chairman, Honourable Perry Christie, Prime Minister of the Commonwealth of the Bahamas, Honourable Ministers of Agriculture, Distinguished Delegates, Dr. Chelston Brathwaite, Director General, Inter-American Institute for Cooperation on Agriculture, Distinguished Representatives of the Diplomatic Corps, Representatives of International and Regional Organizations, Ladies and Gentlemen

I am honoured and pleased to have been invited yet again to speak at the Opening Ceremony of the Caribbean Week of Agriculture.

Apart from being a reflection of the increasingly close cooperation between the OAS General Secretariat and IICA, within the framework of the Inter-American System, this is the third successive occasion for me to address Caribbean Ministers of Agriculture directly, since I assumed the office of Assistant Secretary General of the Organization of American States. It is an opportunity I value greatly.

My presence here is to reaffirm the OAS’ commitment to integral development as one of the three key strategic priorities, in our view of equal importance with strengthening democracy and enhancing security in the Western Hemisphere. We are also here to reaffirm our support to and recognize the importance of the Inter-American Institute for Co-operation on Agriculture, as the main inter-American vehicle to expand the productive capacity of the agricultural sector and to improve rural life.

The relationship between the OAS and IICA is growing and we are pleased that earlier this year we signed a cooperation agreement and as part of that increased collaboration just a fortnight ago, IICA Director-General Braithwaite and his experts spoke at an Extraordinary Meeting of the OAS Permanent Council, as part of the celebration of IICA Day at the OAS. His presentation on the theme “The Promotion of Agricultural and Rural Development in the Hemisphere” was warmly received by all members of the Permanent Council, who endorsed the idea of institutionalising IICA Day and supported the further strengthening of OAS-IICA cooperation.

Dr. Brathwaite’s address to the Permanent Council, backed up by excellent, technical presentations, focused on a strategic vision for agricultural and rural development in the global context of the pursuit of the Millennium Development Goals, specifically those of reducing poverty and hunger and ensuring environmental sustainability, and in the regional context of the Summit of the Americas process and the hemispheric development agenda.

Accordingly, the call for a hemispheric partnership for rural development, which focuses on adding value to traditional agricultural pursuits to support economic progress, stresses the need for:

• developing and promoting the use of bio-technology;

• fostering agro-industrial and agro-tourism linkages;

• modernising agricultural practices; and

• supporting at both the macro and micro levels, strategies and implementation policies for boosting agricultural productivity and trade competitiveness, ensuring food security, alleviating poverty and enhancing rural life.

Mr. Chairman, I reiterate the commitment of the OAS to this strategic vision and to continuing to work with IICA to achieve these objectives.

It would be remiss of me, however, not to acknowledge publicly the contribution of the Caribbean and indeed, that of many of the Ministers and representatives gathered here today, to the development of this strategy.

You will recall that, last year, at the 5th Caribbean Week of Agriculture, in St. Kitts and Nevis, Caribbean delegations examined with IICA, the theme, “Exploring and Enhancing Opportunities for the New Agriculture”, going beyond traditional thinking on agriculture, based on the premise that agriculture, with its vertical and horizontal and backward and forward linkages, is more than farming, and that, the value-added contribution of agriculture to our countries’ GDP is even higher than agricultural production figures would suggest.

Now, with your encouragement, this concept has been taken forward with a view to achieving concrete results. In this respect and in the context of forging a hemispheric partnership for agricultural and rural development, the OAS is an obvious strategic partner.
Both Secretary General José Miguel Insulza and I have repeatedly stated our firm commitment to improving the lives and livelihoods of the people of the Americas.
The OAS, through its Inter-American Council for Integral Development (CIDI), created ten years ago in recognition of the different levels of development among the 34 member countries of the Organization, is itself intent on pursuing a partnership for development cooperation.
CIDI’s strategy emphasizes multi-country and inter-agency activities that are carried out within the framework of eight cross-cutting and inter-related development areas which can all, in varying degrees, be applied to the objective of promoting agricultural and rural development in our countries.
The OAS, through its Office of Sustainable Development and the Environment and the Department of Trade, Tourism and Competitiveness, among others, can play a role as a key strategic partner in pursuing a shared and integrated agenda for development throughout the Hemisphere, and particularly in the Caribbean.
I continue to believe in a holistic and integrated approach to development that combines governance, economic, cultural, social and environmental issues. I know that Dr. Brathwaite shares a similar perspective. Over the past three years, he and I have worked closely together to ensure that the institutional relationship between the OAS and IICA goes from strength to strength, in moving forward a hemispheric development agenda that also takes into consideration the unique needs of the smaller countries of the Hemisphere, especially those of the Caribbean sub-region.
Let us not forget, however, that the challenges faced by our small Caribbean countries, go beyond the agriculture sector. These include, of course, trade liberalisation, market reform and preference erosion, and enhancing national competitiveness in a globalized environment. Indeed, the trade agenda goes beyond the removal of trade barriers, market access and commodity prices, in that the linkages with agriculture and development as a whole are critical for the Caribbean.
Many trade negotiations are taking place at different levels – global, regional, sub-regional and bilateral – and we have to understand that creating sustainable economies, of necessity, has to go beyond the cold, technical details of these negotiations. In this respect, a focus on development from a holistic perspective in every trade and economic agreement is of critical importance. To this end, I reiterate my call for the creation of a policy dialogue space, through the convening of a meeting of Ministers of Trade and of Ministers of Development of the Americas.
Member states of the Caribbean – individually and collectively - have signed trade agreements with many countries in the Western Hemisphere and I believe that it is important to make good use of the opportunities in these agreements to strengthen the agricultural sector.
Now, institutions like ours obviously have a pivotal part to play. But governments too have a critical role, in ensuring that policies are approved, resources allocated, actions implemented, and results delivered in a timely and efficient manner. More than just cooperation, partnership implies co-responsibility and a sharing of the burden to meet the challenges, as much as a sharing of the benefits of cooperation.

I firmly believe that, in meeting these challenges, many of our governments will need to maintain a strong agriculture sector to underpin national and regional development. I also believe that, if we can put our agricultural house in order, then we will be on the way to more sustainable development in the Caribbean.

Specifically, the sub-region has the opportunity to collaborate more meaningfully by using the Caribbean Single Market and Economy (CSME), to produce more of its food needs, especially in the continental Caribbean – Belize, Guyana and Suriname - thereby reducing the sub-region’s dependency on food imports and improving food security.

But the Caribbean Community, in my view, should also look beyond producing for its own needs and explore the possibilities for accessing new markets for agro-industrial exports. It is recommended that existing and future trade agreements be analysed for this purpose.

Allow me now to refer briefly to CARICOM’s “Plan of Action on Agriculture” to address the structural and systemic problems and challenges of Caribbean agriculture, put together under the leadership of President Bharrat Jagdeo of Guyana, CARICOM’s Lead Head with responsibility for Agriculture.

As you know, the recommendations of the “Jagdeo Initiative” are based on an assessment of 10 key binding constraints identified by experts drawn from the CARICOM Secretariat, the Food and Agriculture Organisation, IICA, the Caribbean Agricultural Research and Development Institute, the Caribbean Development Bank and the University of the West Indies.

For each of these constraints, a matrix of interventions with a lead agency has been identified. A major challenge consists in the mobilisation of resources and technical assistance to advance implementation of programmes to overcome the identified constraints in a timely and efficient manner.

In order to support the overall goal of the “Jagdeo Initiative”, namely enhanced food security and sustainable livelihoods of poor rural communities in the Caribbean, we shall all have to work together to identify and obtain the requisite technical assistance and development financing. I fully agree with Minister Roger Clarke’s call for the international financial institutions to commit to acting now to provide financing for the implementation of the recommendations of the “Jagdeo Initiative”.

IICA has already begun to work to this end and has made huge strides forward. Following Dr. Brathwaite’s presentation to the Permanent Council, the OAS will seek to enhance its support to Member States in its areas of expertise. Today, I renew my personal commitment to this process and I pledge the full support of my office.

Before closing I would like to take this opportunity to call on CARICOM Ministers of Agriculture to explore concrete initiatives in support of the Republic of Haiti in the area of agricultural and rural development. These initiatives will go a long way towards ensuring sustainable development and creating a foundation for stability in the sister nation of the Caribbean.

Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen,

What you achieve here this week can only serve to give impetus to the various initiatives under way in the Caribbean to promote agricultural and rural development in the sub-region and to what IICA and the OAS are doing at the hemispheric level.

It is my fervent hope that your recommendations will also inform the preparations for the Meeting of Hemispheric Ministers of Agriculture, in Guatemala, next year. The continued, active support of Member States in IICA and the OAS, at the sub-regional and hemispheric levels, is vital.

Mr. Chairman, Ladies and Gentlemen, it may well be better in The Bahamas and so, I have no doubt that Caribbean agriculture will indeed be better off after the deliberations of this conference. I wish you every success and I look forward to the outcome of your deliberations.

Thank you