Ministry of Foreign Affairs & Foreign Trade

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The two-day meeting of the G77 High Level Panel of Eminent Personalities on a Development Platform for the South which took place in Antigua and Barbuda ended on Wednesday 30 April, 2008, with a comprehensive discussion on South-South co-operation.

In the closing remarks, the Prime Minister of Antigua and Barbuda, the Honourable Baldwin Spencer, Chairman of the G77, stressed the importance of the work of the Panel to the future development of the G77 which comprises of 130 member countries and China. These remarks were complemented by those of the Most Honourable Percival Patterson, former Prime Minister of Jamaica and a former chairman of the G77, who, in addition to the many issues discussed over the two days, including the role of the private sector, emphasised that the G77 should be people-oriented and not exclusive and elitist, and must include the concerns of the workers and their representative institutions such as the trade unions if it were to serve satisfactorily the needs of the people.

Prime Minister Spencer, in thanking the members of the Panel, saw the output of their meeting as a vital contribution to the preparations for upcoming G77 Meetings in Cote D'Ivoire and in Argentina. The G77 is preparing for the United Nations High Level Conference on South-South Co-operation scheduled for Buenos Aires, Argentina, in 2009 and a preparatory meeting in Abidjan, Cote D'Ivoire, on the occasion of the 45th Anniversary of its founding. The outcome of these preparatory meetings will be the Development Platform for the South which will from the basis of the discussions at the Argentina Conference.

Among the challenges identified by the Panel were: trade; production, including food; energy; the environment, including climate change; information and communication; science and technology; and institutional arrangements. This last subject was a point emphasised by His Excellency Edwin Carrington, Secretary-General of the Caribbean Community (CARICOM), who stressed the necessity for any central structure to work with and through existing sub-regional and regional institutions in serving its 130-country membership.

There was significant Caribbean participation at the meeting including, the Most Honourable Percival Patterson, CARICOM Secretary-General, His Excellency Edwin Carrington, Deputy Secretary-General of the Commonwealth, Ambassador Ransford Smith of Jamaica, Professor Dennis Benn of the University of the West Indies, Permanent Representative of Antigua and Barbuda to the United Nations, His Excellency Ambassador John Ashe and the Deputy Permanent Representative, His Excellency Ambassador Conrod Hunte.

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