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Last Updated: Mar 21, 2021 - 11:31:48 AM |
The Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Commonwealth of The Bahamas is pleased to inform the general public that H.E. Mr Reuben Rahming, High Commissioner of The Bahamas to the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), led the Bahamian delegation on behalf of the Honourable Darren A. Henfield, Minister of Foreign Affairs, to the Tenth UK-Caribbean Forum (which includes CARICOM, Cuba and the Dominican Republic). The Forum was chaired by Lord Ahmad, Minister for South Asia and the Commonwealth at the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office (FCDO) of the United Kingdom, and was held virtually Thursday, 18 March 2021.
During the Caribbean Forum-UK, Foreign Ministers of CARICOM Member-States and the Minister for the Caribbean, Lord Ahmad, Chair of the Forum, engaged in discussions on diverse topics. These topics included building economic resilience for Caribbean countries in light of the COVID-19 pandemic and climate change, Small Island Developing States (SIDS) and development aspects of disaster preparedness and response, the CARIFORUM-UK Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA), immigration issues, the Windrush Generation, defence and security cooperation, and shared values between the Caribbean and the United Kingdom.
High Commissioner Rahming, addressing the Forum, thanked the United Kingdom for its support following Hurricane Dorian, noting, in particular, the impact of climate change being experienced first-hand by SIDS. He called for targeted action to achieve healthy oceans, rather than a proliferation of a multiplicity of initiatives on oceans and climate change. He remarked that realistic implementation was needed to see results. Further, the High Commissioner expressed solidarity with the rest of the Caribbean on the use of the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita index to determine a country’s wealth and called for the more inclusive Multidimensional Vulnerability Index, which takes into account susceptibly to natural disasters, lack of diversification, small internal markets, the lack of economies of scale, and the dependence on non-renewable energy sources. The meeting concluded with the digital signing of the Tenth UK-Caribbean Forum Communiqué.
The 9th Forum was hosted by The Bahamas in Grand Bahama on 29-30 April 2016. Normally a biennial meeting, unforeseen and unscheduled circumstances delayed the holding of the 10th Forum by the UK.
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