Grenada is the venue for a 3-day meeting, where employers and labour representatives within the region will gather to discuss a number of regional challenges including positions on social and economic issues.
A regional bipartite meeting organised by the International Labour Organisation (ILO), together with the Caribbean Employers’ Confederation and the Caribbean Congress of Labour, will take place from 3–5 November at the Grenadian by rex resorts.
The meeting follows a series of national workshops which were held between July and October 2015, in 14 CARIFORUM member states — St Lucia, Grenada, Dominica, Antigua and Barbuda, St Kitts and Nevis, Haiti, Jamaica, Belize, the Bahamas, Barbados, St Vincent and the Grenadines, Suriname, Guyana, and Trinidad and Tobago.
These national workshops determined joint points of action to formalise and institutionalize national social dialogue, and identified priority areas of concern. At the regional meeting, each member state will report back on the actions agreed at the national workshops. Representatives from Caribbean employers’ and workers’ organisations will also develop positions on social and economic issues to be furthered at the regional level.
The meetings form part of a three-year project funded by the European Union and executed by the ILO, which seeks to build capacity of Caribbean regional employers’ and workers’ organisations, so that they can make substantive contributions to policy-setting aimed at regional development and the integration process, and thus fulfil their obligations under the social aspects chapter of the Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA).
“The project is also an opportunity to develop and build on the ILO structures that are so critical to bring about sustainable policies, programmes, and strategies needed to implement the decent work agenda and fulfil CARIFORUM’s commitment to good governance and the implementation of the EPA,” stated Claudia Coenjaerts, director, ILO.
“In order to build and deliver a coherent programme of ILO support in any country, it must be based on and owned by all 3 of our constituents — the Government, the workers and employers. Tripartism is the ILO’s fundamental strength, and it allows us to bring together many experiences and perspectives.”
