MEXICO CITY, Mexico (CMC) — Caribbean Community (CARICOM) countries are looking to Mexico for assistance in reversing a decision by developed countries to re-classify the regional states thereby limiting their access to access to vital concessionary and development financing.
The CARICOM leaders are in Mexico attending the Third CARICOM-Mexico summit and the Sixth Summit of Heads of State and/or Government of the Association of Caribbean States (ACS) that ends later on Wednesday.
CARICOM co-chairman and Barbados Prime Minister Freundel Stuart said that Mexico’s membership of the G20 provides an important platform for it to promulgate the views of small states such as those of the Caribbean, “thus enabling a greater understanding and acceptance of the peculiar circumstances which apply to us”.
He said the 2008 global economic and financial crisis has exacerbated the economic challenges faced by CARICOM member states and that “many are struggling under high debt burdens.
“Their classification as middle-income, upper-middle income, or high-income countries limits access to vital concessionary and development financing,” Prime Minister Stuart said, adding “CARICOM will continue to advocate for an alternative measure of development to that of GDP per capita, and for these measures to take into account the overall conditions of our vulnerability and resilience in the context of sustainable development.
“We will continue to need Mexico’s valuable support in that endeavour,” he said.
Jamaica’s Prime Minister Portia Simpson Miller is attending the Summit.
