Caribbean Times 75th issue - Wednesday 23rd March 2016

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20 c a r i b b e a n t i m e s . a g Wednesday 23rd March 2016 CDB funds training for food service professionals in Dominica BRIDGETOWN – As the Government of Dominica focuses on enhancing its hospitality sector and improving opportunities for tourism investment, it is driving initiatives to provide best-practice training for local food service businesses. From March 21 to 23, 2016, 30 Environmental Health Officers and representatives from Dominica’s Micro, Small and Medium-Sized Enterprises (MSMEs) will participate in the ServSafe Food Safety and Training Workshop, conducted and funded by the Caribbean Development Bank (CDB). “CDB supports the Government of Dominica as it focuses on the importance of food safety and the role it plays in economic development. We are pleased to be collaborating with the Ministry of Health to deliver this workshop, specially designed for local food service professionals through the internationally and regionally recognised ServSafe Food Safety Programme,” said Edward Greene, Division Chief, Technical Cooperation Division, CDB. The ServSafe Programme is an accredited, United States-based educational course that provides comprehensive training for food service professionals. It is accepted throughout the Caribbean region and recognised as a fundamental certification for food handlers. During the three-day workshop, participants will explore food safety principles and techniques such as cleaning and sanitation; Hazard Analysis and Critical Control Points; methods of thawing, cooking, cooling and reheating food; safe food preparation; and time and temperature control. At the end of the workshop, participants will take the ServSafe Food Protection Manager Examination. Successful participants will receive the ServSafe Food Protection Manager Certificate, which is valid for a period of five years. Participants will also develop action plans to upgrade the food safety practices at their establishments, with the help of certified ServSafe Instructors. The Ministry of Health in Dominica will help participants implement these plans. The Caribbean Technological Consultancy Services Network (CTCS), managed in the Bank’s Technical Cooperation Division, will oversee the delivery of the workshop. “CTCS was specifically designed to help CDB fulfil its commitment to enhancing the capacity of MSMEs throughout the Caribbean Region. This workshop is one way in which we continue to turn that commitment into action, to boost the livelihoods of our Region’s entrepreneurs,”said Mr. Greene. Workshop facilitators are Julie-Ann Laudat of JAL Training and Consultancy Services, a company based in Antigua and Barbuda and Lionel Michael, Chief Health Inspector of the Ministry of Health in Antigua and Barbuda. Both Laudat and Michael are trained and certified ServSafe Instructors and Proctors. The ServSafe Food Safety and Training Workshop in Dominica follows successful pilots run by CTCS in Antigua and Barbuda, Montserrat and Guyana over the past two years. The workshop, a technical assistance intervention, aligns with CDB’s strategic objective to promote broad-based economic growth by providing support to private sector development, which aims to enhance the viability of MSMEs. cont’d from pg 19 A profound love of family. A passion for our children, a commitment to their education. And that’s why I believe our grandchildren will look back on this period of isolation as an aberration, as just one chapter in a longer story of family and of friendship. But we cannot, and should not, ignore the very real differences that we have -- about how we organize our governments, our economies, and our societies. Cuba has a one-party system; the United States is a multi-party democracy. Cuba has a socialist economic model; the United States is an open market. Cuba has emphasized the role and rights of the state; the United States is founded upon the rights of the individual. Despite these differences, on December 17th 2014, President Castro and I announced that the United States and Cuba would begin a process to normalize relations between our countries. Since then, we have established diplomatic relations and opened embassies. We’ve begun initiatives to cooperate on health and agriculture, education and law enforcement. We’ve reached agreements to restore direct flights and mail service. We’ve expanded commercial ties, and increased the capacity of Americans to travel and do business in Cuba. And these changes have been welcomed, even though there are still opponents to these policies. But still, many people on both sides of this debate have asked: Why now? Why now? There is one simple answer: What the United States was doing was not working. We have to have the courage to acknowledge that truth. A policy of isolation designed for the Cold War made little sense in the 21st century. The embargo was only hurting the Cuban people instead of helping them. And I’ve always believed in what Martin Luther King, Jr. called “the fierce urgency of now” -- we should not fear change, we should embrace it. That leads me to a bigger and more important reason for these changes: Creo en el pueblo Cubano. I believe in the Cuban people. This is not just a policy of normalizing relations with the Cuban government. The United States of America is normalizing relations with the Cuban people.
Wednesday 23rd March 2016 c a r i b b e a n t i m e s . a g 21 Suriname eases visa regime to boost tourism PARAMARIBO - In an effort to boost its new emphasis on the tourism sector, the government of Suriname has recently abolished the requirement for a visa to enter the country from an additional 13 countries, including China, India, Indonesia and Turkey, four of the world’s most populous nations. The nine other countries are from Latin America. The list does not include any African or Arab countries. However, to visit Suriname, citizens of these countries must purchase a tourist card, which costs US $35 at the Johan Pengel International Airport. The tourist card isn’t available at the official border crossing posts between Suriname, Guyana and French Guiana, which is an inconvenience for some travellers. Moreover, the immigration and customs processing to enter Suriname PORT AU PRINCE - Haitian lawmakers Sunday night rejected economist Fritz Jean as the country’s new prime minister, sending the provisional Government in the French-speaking Caribbean Community country into a state of uncertainty. Jean, named by Interim President Jocelerme Privert, needed at least 60 of the 119 members of the Lower House to support his nomination. But HAVANA – Global money transfer company Western Union has announced plans to extend its money transfer services to Cuba. The move will allow persons worldwide to send remittances into Cuba within minutes. It comes a week after the US government relaxed some trade policies that will allow financial institutions to do more business with Cuba and will also allow some categories from Guyana at the South Drain Ferry Terminal is a long and arduous ordeal that can take up to three hours. The Parliament of Suriname is expected to soon pass legislation to govern the tourism industry. Suriname, once isolated from the non-Dutch speaking world, has in the past decade propelled itself closer to the English-speaking Caribbean, Latin America and Asia. Concluding bilateral air agreements with key countries has when the vote was taken on Sunday evening he received 38 votes with 36 against, with one legislator abstaining. “Mr Prime Minister, 38 deputies voted in favour to your general policy statement, as the majority required in terms of section 158 of the 1987 amended Constitution is at least 60 votes, which constitutes the absolute majority, required your general policy statement is rejected.” The vote leaves President Privert without a person to run the Government’s day-today affairs and he also failed to get support for the new Provisional Electoral Council (CEP) that is needed to organise the twice-postponed presidential runoff vote now tentatively scheduled for April 24. President Michel Martelly left office on February 7 without any successor being elected, and last week Sandra of Cuban nationals to earn money in the US without defecting. In a statement, Western union said it expects to activate money transfer services in Cuba by end of the second quarter of 2016. The company says once services are activated in Cuba, receivers will be able to pick-up their funds from more than 490 agent locations across each of Cuba’s 16 provinces. been very slow for Suriname, and the country’s national airline, Surinam Airways (SLM), is a loss making enterprise. The government is now looking to privatize SLM. The modernisation and expansion of the Johan Pengel International Airport is still incomplete. Suriname, which the New York Times referred to as “South America’s hidden treasure”, is slowing working to develop and improve its eco- and cultural tourism product. More recently, Suriname has been promoting its tourism product in Holland, Belgium and now Germany. However, there is little or no promotion in North America, and the Caribbean. Airlift is a major problem facing Suriname’s unique and excellent tourism product. (Caribbean News Now). Haitian legislators reject nominee for PM Western Union to extend services to Cuba Honore, the top UN envoy for Haiti, told the United Nations Security Council that Haiti was at a “critical juncture” in consolidating its democracy and the next few weeks would be decisive. Jean had been nominated and then sworn in at a ceremony at the National Palace in the hopes that his experience and reputation as an economist and former governor of Haiti’s central bank would overcome objections from opposition lawmakers. In his inaugural speech on Sunday, he told lawmakers that the new Government “is committed to providing to all institutions involved in the electoral process the necessary means for achieving the objectives. (Jamaica Observer).
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Caribbean Times 75th issue - Wednesday 23rd March 2016

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