Report of the Expert Group Meeting on the Caribbean Information Society

The meeting was convened as part of this office's strategy to continue to provide support to CDCC Member States in implementing the WSIS Plan of Action. The thirty two participants were in general knowledgeable about the Information Society activities of their respective governments and organisations. The objective of the meeting was to apprise CDCC Member Countries of the activities which the Secretariat had undertaken in the area of Information and Communications Technology for Development as a follow up to the Twentieth Session of the CDCC and in response to the resolution tabled at that session; to facilitate the exchange of information among countries and agencies in the region with respect to ICTs for development in general and the WSIS process in particular; hear reports on progress made at the national level, with special focus on the area of e-government and government policies in the area of ICTs; and to get a snapshot as to where the region is positioned vis a vis the WSIS agenda. A Caribbean ICT Stocktaking report was presented and there was an update on the e-LAC strategy. Several recommendations were made with respect to ECLAC's continuing involvement in this area - among them, that ECLAC should assist countries with preparing national e-strategies, develop strategic partnerships especially with the CARICOM Secretariat, develop databases and other information four use by the CDCC countries and continue its stocktaking work

Report of the AD HOC Expert Group meeting on social exclusion, poverty, inequality, crime and violence: Towardsa research agenda for informed public policy for Caribbean SIDS

The Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), Subregional Headquarters for the Caribbean convened an expert group meeting on Social Exclusion, Poverty, Inequality – Crime and Violence: Towards a Research Agenda for informed Public Policy for Caribbean SIDS on Friday 4 April 2008, at its conference room in Port of Spain. The meeting was attended by 14 experts drawn from, the University of the West Indies (UWI), St. Augustine, Trinidad and Tobago; and Mona Campus, Jamaica; the St. Georges University, Grenada; the Trinidad and Tobago Crime Commission and the Ministry of Social Development, Government of Trinidad and Tobago and representative of Civil Society from Guyana. Experts from the United Nations System included representatives from the United Nations Fund for Women (UNIFEM), Barbados; the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), Port of Spain and UNDP Barbados/SRO and the Organisation of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS). The list of participants appears as an annex to this report. The purpose of the meeting was to provide a forum in which differing theories and methodologies useful to addressing the issues of social exclusion, poverty, inequality, crime and violence could be explored. It was expected that at the end of the meeting there would be consensus on areas of research which could be pursued over a two to four-year period by the ECLAC Subregional Headquarters for the Caribbean and its partners, which would lead to informed public policy in support of the reduction of the growing violence in Caribbean society.