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06/17/2004

Press Release

C-TRADECOM's Competitiveness Director to Speak at FTAA symposium

C-TRADECOM's Competitiveness Director, Mr. Ronald Dubrisingh, will be one of the speakers at a symposium geared toward strengthening the competitive position of Caribbean businesses to succeed in a post Free Trade Area of the Americas (FTAA) environment.

The regional symposium, which is under the theme “Florida Caribbean Collaborative Development Strategies: Positioning Caribbean Businesses to Compete in an FTAA Era,” is being held at the Sherbourne Conference Centre, Barbados, on June 23-24. It is being presented by the World Trade Center, Miami, and Caribbean-Central American Action in collaboration with the Caribbean Community. One of the agencies supporting the event is the United States Agency for International Development, through its Caribbean Trade and Competitiveness Development Program (C-TRADECOM).

James Moss-Solomon, a noted Caribbean business executive, University of the West Indies Executive-In-Residence, and organizer of the symposium, hopes the program will lead to a renewed agenda of cooperation and partnership among economic and political stakeholders in the Caribbean and Florida.

The conference is substantially based on a position paper entitled “From Insular to International – What Strategies.” Business and academic leaders and policy makers from the Caribbean and the state of Florida will address strategies for maximizing the benefits of the FTAA, while recognizing the critical challenges that need to be surmounted to ensure greater harmony between the development concerns of smaller Caribbean economies and trade liberalization.

Prominent experts and government leaders from the Caribbean and Florida will lead sessions on the current and future outlook of the Caribbean related to best practices for small-and medium-sized companies, target marketing, international joint ventures, capital markets, and non-traditional investments.

Some of the topics on the agenda include “Florida and the Caribbean: The Strategic Importance of the Relationship,” Target Marketing – Accessing Caribbean Nationals Living Overseas,” “Formation of a Caribbean Stock Exchange and Promoting Non-traditional Investment Mechanisms,” and “Upgrading and Benchmarking Against International Standards – Best Practices for Small and Medium-Sized Caribbean Businesses.”

For further information log on to www.worldtrade.org/FC-program.htm or e-mail Melinda Packman at mpackman@c-caa.org or Sherry Tross at info@worldtrade.org .