Six Countries Sign Up To CARICOM Single Market

by Amanda Banks, Tax-News.com, London

01 February 2006

Six Caricom member states this week formally signed a declaration of their governments' compliance with the provisions of the Treaty establishing the Caricom Single Market and Economy (CSM).

The countries, namely Barbados, Belize, Guyana, Jamaica, Suriname and Trinidad and Tobago, became the first six Caricom countries to have signed on to the single market.

Heads of government on Monday signed a document entitled 'Declaration by Heads of Government of the Caribbean Community marking the coming into being of the Caricom Single Market'. These Member States entered into Single Market arrangements on 1 January 2006.

However, the leaders of the six Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS) agreed during a meeting in Jamaica preceding the official ceremony to push the Caricom Single Market start date for compliance to June 30. The OECS states include Antigua and Barbuda, Dominica, Grenada, St Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia and St Vincent and the Grenadines.

Of the three remaining Member States, The Bahamas and Haiti have not signified their intention to participate in the CSME process and Montserrat - a British Dependency - is awaiting the necessary instrument of entrustment from the United Kingdom's government.

Secretary-General H.E. Mr. Edwin Carrington described the launch of the Single Market as an "historic and unprecedented step" in the regional integration process, and a new dimension that will change the way the people of the region live and work. He has urged the region to be "fully prepared" for the challenge that will come with the launch of the CSM.

Meanwhile, Caricom’s Assistant Secretary-General for Human and Social Development, Dr. Edward Greene, believes that the free movement of goods, services, capital and persons will be an opportunity for Caricom nationals “to make the Caribbean one market that would work for individuals irrespective of their country of origin”.

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