NASSAU, BAHAMAS – On Tuesday December 4th, Prime Minister Leona Romeo Marlin spoke at the 3rd Caribbean Infrastructure Forum, CARIF 2018 held in Nassau, Bahamas. The forum is designed to catalyze the financing and construction of the world-class infrastructure projects that are necessary in the Caribbean by bringing together government officials, utility companies and capital financing providers.
The topic of the Ministerial Roundtable/Panel centered around, “How are resiliency & climate change issues shaping the evolution of regional policy making”. Joining Prime Minister Leona Romeo Marlin on the panel were Joseph Hew, Cayman Islands Minister of Commerce Planning and Infrastructure, Kirk Humphrey, Barbados Minister of the Blue Economy.
Prime Minister Romeo-Marlin while participating in the Ministerial Roundtable shared the following introductory remarks, “On behalf of the Government and people of St. Maarten, I take this opportunity to thank you for inviting me to this 3rd Caribbean Infrastructure Forum – CARIF 2018. It is a pleasure to share, discuss & network with ministers of Government, key stakeholders, policy makers and influential development partners over the next to 2 days in this wonderful setting here in the Bahamas.”
Prime Minister addressed how the Government of Sint Maarten is executing the rebuilding process through the National Recovery & Resilience Plan. Questions from the moderator also centered around which keys sectors are being focused on during the recovery. The Prime Minister informed the conference attendees that following, are areas that require the most attention, Housing 22.8%, Tourism & Commerce 19%, Governance & Public Financial Management 9.4%, Sanitation & Solid Waste Management 8.3%, Rebuilding the SXM Airport / Aviation sector 7.6 %,
Education Culture Youth & Sport 5.1%. In closing, the Prime Minister reminded the attendees that “Recovery is not a sprint, it’s a marathon.”
Throughout the conference lots of interesting information and ideas were shared by different panelist, including the idea of Caribbean countries developing their individual Blue Economy, reducing dependency on fossil fuels and turning to alternatives such as renewable energy and LNG for power generation. Public Private Partnerships or P3 models were discussed during the session on how the financing of large infrastructure projects can benefit Governments in the region. CARIF 2018 concluded on Wednesday December 5th.
