One of the recommendations from the recent Google TechMakers, Caribbean Women in Tech Summit was the need for relevant statistics for the region. This represents one of our successes in lobbying for change in approaches to treatment of developing nations in international policy and strategy.
It involved intense front and backroom lobbying, advocacy and negotiations with global interests and regional partners, driven by the Latin American Group. I am proud to have been able to pilot, negotiate and advise and support colleagues on the UNESCO Executive Board while I served as Vice President of the Programme and External Relations Commission in accomplishing this.
Flashback Report
OCTOBER 21, 2015 BY EDITOR IN OECS & CARICOM, REGIONAL, WORLD
PARIS – UNESCO’s Finance Commission has unanimously supported the call to challenge the development categorisation of countries according to gross domestic product (GDP) tabled by Trinidad and Tobago’s representative to the UNESCO Executive Board, Dr Kris Rampersad.
Revision of Categorisations
Rampersad advocated revision of the GDP basis for economic categorisation of states into small, medium and large categories promoted by global financial organisations such as the World Bank, noting it does not reflect the tremendous disparities in income, levels of poverty and inequalities within countries. It is part of a draft resolution proposed by Caribbean representatives and global SIDS with support from others for UNESCO to develop a focussed strategy of programme implementation and means of financing and resourcing an action plan for SIDS.
Mandate to UNESCO Institute of Statistics
It requests that UNESCO’s Institute of Statistics collate the relevant data for phased presentation to the Executive Board, “taking account of the vulnerabilities linked to limitations of size and resources economies of scale, indebtedness, external economic shocks and natural hazard occurrences and resources.”
Global Support
Support for the resolution came from not only small island developing states (SIDS) of the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans but also ‘developed’ island states as the UK as well as countries like the United States, Sweden, and China who recognised the place of SIDS in achieving the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals and to ‘the future of the planet.’
UNESCO’s Finance Commission (FA) is charged with examining budgetary provisions of the organisation. It is one of two commissions, with the Programme and External Relations Commission (PX), which is co-chaired by Dr Rampersad with the representative of Mexico.
Implications for SIDS, Developing World
“This has implications for not only on SIDS but all of the developing world, Unless these misrepresentations are addressed we are likely to face the same pitfalls in meeting the United Nation’s new Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) as with the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs),” said Rampersad, an independent development educator/consultant who has been promoting culture-centred approaches to development as the UNESCO-trained heritage facilitator for the Caribbean and Trinidad and Tobago’s Representative to the Executive Board, 2013-2017.
Persistent Poverty
She noted that persistent poverty and other glossed-over internal challenges have hampered achievement of the Millennium Goals. She observed that the GDP classifications have also restricted access to technical and other resources by civil society and others working to redress the imbalances at poverty, gender disparity and other inequalities at ground level.
GRULAC at UNESCO
Trinidad and Tobago became a member of the UNESCO Executive Board with the highest number of votes among the Group of Latin American and Developing Countries (GRULAC) at UNESCO elections of 2013. New members will be admitted to the 58-member Executive Board following elections carded for the upcoming UNESCO General Conference in November 2015, where all Executive Board resolutions will be finalised and adopted. (Caribbean News Now).
UNESCO supports Trinidad’s challenge to WB classifications of island states – Caribbean Times News
About Dr Kris Rampersad
Dr Kris Rampersad is an international sustainable development diplomat and educator, pioneering change and transformation for Latin America and the Caribbean, SIDS, and the Developing World. More in this link.
Dr Kris Rampersad Discusses Digital Deletion and Challenges to Education in the New Age go to You tube Link
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