Regional trade negotiator calls for unity

Today businessmen and women from across the country met in Belize City to discuss the future of the nation’s international trade. Facilitating the talks is Dr. Richard Bernal, Director General of the Caribbean Regional Negotiating Machinery. Bernal has been endorsed by CARICOM governments to negotiate on behalf of the region with the global trade bodies. According to Bernal, Belize’s best bet is to work as one with the Caribbean.

Richard Bernal, Chief Caribbean Negotiator

“Our production in relation to the global market is extremely small, so there is room enough for us to promote all the production of the CARICOM, without doing any harm to individual members. Sticking together is essential because it increases our leverage and our influence in these multilateral and regional negotiating fora. Also, it economises on the technical financial and human resources required to do the negotiations, because we can pool and therefore each country doesn’t have to attend every meeting. So there are benefits in cooperating and sticking together.”

“I think Belize has enormous export potential in a range of sectors and Belize can benefit from increased and improved market access, particularly to the countries of the developed country group. And I think that Belize is in a position to be internationally competitive in many products.”

Today’s meeting was hosted by the Ministry of Investment and Foreign Trade.