The Role of the International Cooperation Council

Eamon Courtenay

Back in September, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Foreign Trade and Immigration held the inaugural meeting of the International Cooperation Council. Established by cabinet, this entity will look at cooperation programs that Belize has with friendly countries and institutions to ensure that there is no duplication of efforts. Foreign Minister Eamon Courtenay says that another meeting of the council is scheduled for November.  

Eamon Courtenay, Minister of Foreign Affairs

“What we want to do is to coordinate this. So for example, just as an example, the Ministry of Agriculture would go out and speak to, let’s say, Food and Agricultural Organization seeking a loan or seeking some sort of technical assistance. At the same time, we at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs may be talking to a friendly country saying the Ministry of Agriculture needs help with technical assistance. We are asking two different people, two different organizations for the same thing simply because there is no coordination. The hope is that it will be far more efficient, far more coordinated. We had the inaugural meeting and the prime minister was there in his capacity as the Minister of Investment and Economic Development and we set out the framework and now we have, I believe, next month, the next meeting coming up at the technical level and the level of C.E.O.s to put in place what needs to be done.”