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The support, shown in the accompanying table, is spread over the ACS focal areas of trade, transport, sustainable tourism and the prevention and mitigation of natural disasters.
ACS COOPERATION PROJECTS
Donors have shown a particularly strong interest in the last area. They agree with recipients that assistance is most effective when it reduces the loss of life and property resulting from future disasters. Projects such as the updating of building codes and training in early warning systems are oriented to this end.
Language training aims at breaking down one of the chief barriers to communication in the Greater Caribbean region. The ACS project is targeted at officials, businesspersons and teachers in the OECS sub-region; and includes a Spanish and French language component. As a pilot project, a great deal depends on the lessons to be learnt from Phase 1, which gets off the ground in January 2003.
Sustainable tourism is another area in which donors are showing interest. The ACS has an ambitious programme to establish the Sustainable Tourism Zone of the Caribbean. The technical basis is being provided by development of sustainability indicators, a project supported by the French Caribbean Departments of Martinique and Guadeloupe. Also on the cards is a meeting of regional airlines and other industry players on multi-destination tourism.
Transport is a vital support service for expanded trade and regional tourism. The Internet-delivered Port and Maritime Data Base is to be developed in collaboration with the Caribbean Shipping Association. Recently, Italy, through the Inter-American Development Bank (IDB), confirmed funding for this innovative project. An IDB-ACS Memorandum of Understanding, to be signed this week in Port-of-Spain, will further boost cooperation between the two institutions.
The Ford Foundation is supporting a study of special and differential treatment of small economies in international trade negotiations. And Martinique and Mexico are giving strategic assistance for institutional strengthening of ACS capabilities in developing cooperation.
The interest of the French Caribbean Departments (DOMs) in regional cooperation through the ACS is especially gratifying. Martinique has been Vice Chair of the ACS Tourism Committee and was last week elected as Vice Chair of the Committee on Transport. The President of its Regional Council, M. Alfred Marie-Jeanne, attended last year’s ACS Summit and the Belize Ministerial Meeting. So cross-language and cross-political linkages are growing.