English-speaking Caribbean countries have not been able to benefit from their proximity to Spanish neighbors in the Caribbean and Latin America according to Counterpart President.
SANTO DOMINGO, Dominican Republic, August 13, 2005 CMC - President and Chief Executive Officer of Counterpart International Lelei LeLaulu has lamented the fact that English-speaking Caribbean countries have not been able to benefit from their proximity to Spanish neighbors in the Caribbean and Latin America.
"This is one of the lamentable missing links which the Caribbean is losing out on, as there is an enormous treasure trove of experience and knowledge which resides in the Spanish-speaking Caribbean," he told the Caribbean Media Corporation (CMC) Friday.
Counterpart International is one of the main engines behind this week's First International Conference on Environmental and Sustainable Development at which its Caribbean Media Exchange on Sustainable Tourism CMEx model has taken centre stage.
Delegates from across the Caribbean, Central and South America, the Pacific, the United States and Europe are attending the three-day Dominican Republic conference which is exploring issues related to the sustainable use of the environment.
The Counterpart President, a Pacific islander, said that it was unfortunate that the Caribbean had not utilized the best of what it has available and obtained support for initiatives in the area of tourism, the environment, and disaster preparedness.
He said that the Spanish Caribbean is part of the region that has been mainly dealing with mass tourism, and while there are ways in which it can improve the way it handles it, mass tourism and large visitor arrivals is an area the English-speaking Caribbean can also explore. In doing so, he said, it can learn from the mistakes of others.
The Counterpart Head said that the region had traditionally been divided not just by a communications problem but by a colonial history where different Western powers ensured Caribbean colonies did not speak to their neighbors who were ruled differently.
However the development expert suggested that no single Caribbean island could consider itself truly independent if it was unable to operate within a multilingual framework.
"If I can only deal with the Spanish in Caribbean or I can only relate to the English-speaking nations, then I cannot be truly an independent State capable of taking full advantage of my status. This is a post colonial hang up which is a disincentive to development and you have to deal with it by finding common ground," he said.
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