SEVERAL global summits took place last month. Current issues of common interest were discussed among leaders of the Americas, the European Union, BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, and South Africa nations) and the Commonwealth.

Caribbean Community (CARICOM) leaders returned from the Commonwealth Summit in Kigali, Rwanda, and gathered in Paramaribo, Suriname, from July 3-5 for their 43rd leaders’ summit, coinciding with CARICOM’s 49th birth anniversary.

Following their regional summit, it is refreshingly clear that CARICOM’s leaders have all accepted and are responding to the urgent need to grasp all opportunities provided by current challenges, while adapting and adjusting to those that will require different strokes.

Guyana has all reasons to be humbly happy, as, for a second year, the region has shown appreciative support for its proven leadership in the quest to reduce the region’s food-import bill by 25 per cent by 2025.

There’s clear evidence that from Belize to Barbados, Suriname to Trinidad and Tobago, regional governments are demonstrating the readiness and willingness to go those extra yards and miles necessary to rebuild and consolidate the region’s capacity to do more for and by itself.

This will be done hopefully with, but not totally dependent on, help from friends who can and are willing to give.

The basis for pursuing regional food security has always been there (as with Belize, Guyana and Haiti already producing over 50 per cent of their food) and there has also been a new flurry of regional agricultural and economic cooperation of late, pointing to a greater appreciation of the need for more urgency.

For example: Guyana will assist Trinidad and Tobago in aromatic rice production and help Barbados in aquaculture; Barbados and Suriname signed a bilateral cooperation agreement during the CARICOM summit; Guyana and Barbados are working out modalities for hospitality training for 6,000 persons; and Guyanese gold will soon have an outlet at Barbados’ Grantley Adams International Airport.

Additionally, the Guyana private sector is opening up to wider Caribbean cooperation; Suriname is promoting a regional equity fund for joint Caribbean investments and is also calling on CARICOM to find ways to fast-track promotion of abundant gas reserves (in Guyana, Suriname and Trinidad and Tobago) to develop regional fertilizer production; and Saint Lucia is calling for the region to increase and improve its technical capacity to re-evaluate and refine the models being used to assess social and economic progress.

Guyana has pledged to help fellow CARICOM states overcome common high fuel and energy costs and challenges, as in the small islands of the Organization of Eastern Caribbean States (OECS), where current efforts to absorb related price increases to protect the ordinary majority are creating fiscal challenges that simply cannot be sustained.

Guyana’s development focus today includes a wider Caribbean engagement based on restored trust in its promises, pledges and proactive undertakings.

Under those occupying the Opposition parliamentary benches today, Guyana’s commitment to CARICOM was always characterized by ‘ifs’ and ‘buts.’

Same with their responses to the results of mediations by CARICOM leaders in national political crises they created, always guided more by partisan politics than anything else.

Since August 2020, however, CARICOM has been able to more confidently rely on Guyana’s pledges. Reflected in the repeated words of confidence expressed by his regional colleagues, President, Dr Irfaan Ali’s leadership zeroes in on, among other things, revitalizing and revolutionizing agriculture and ensuring the region can feed its people well.

Unlike when good ideas were always in deficit at state levels in the immediate past administration, Guyana is, today, quite fortunate to have its current political leadership — especially in these stormy times when the urgency of finding sustainable solutions to the region’s challenging problems requires not just talk.

What is required now more than ever is demonstrable action, confidence and reliability between leaders and nations, as well as between governments and peoples.