During an address to the British Chamber of Commerce in Santo Domingo, Caribbean Council Director David Jessops focused on issues pertaining to the relations of the region’s states in the light of the negotiations underway for an Economic Partnership Agreement (EPA) between Europe and the ACP member states in the Caribbean region. Jessops understands the complex issues include (1) economic challenges and the relative advantage of the DR when compared to the English-speaking countries in the region, (2) the longer term role the DR is seeking within the region and Latin America, (3) the nature of Europe’s long-term relationship with the Caribbean, and (4) the variable levels of development within the region and the need for greater mutual understanding. Anglophone Caribbean nations express their fear of being marginalized in favor of more advanced developing economies, a process that could take away the advantages they had enjoyed previously in preferential arrangements with Europe. Jessops argued that no one would be able to create a homogeneous single regional market rapidly enough to withstand the stresses of globalization. He added that Caricom nations want to deepen the integration process through the creation of a Caribbean Single Market and Economy (CSME) but have not been successful. On the contrary, it is in danger of dividing into very different economic units. At one end there is Trinidad and Tobago, a nation rich in oil and gas, which has emerged as a significant trading partner of the Dominican Republic on a reciprocal basis. At the other end of the scale are the small islands of the Eastern Caribbean which have begun to wonder what benefits the CSME might bring them and the extent to which an EPA with Europe would have any value. They believe they should be given special and differential treatment based on the growing trade imbalances between larger and smaller Caribbean states, their high level of indebtedness, and the difficulty of achieving competitiveness. Barbados Prime Minister Owen Arthur is suggesting the creation of a fund similar to that successfully established by the European Union to reduce disparities between its member nations. The EU has invested Euro324 since the mid 1980s to enable the poorer member states to catch up with their neighbors. Other difficulties are the lack of agreement on the manner in which the CSME will operate and whether Caricom should be afforded some sort of executive authority over it. Jessops informed that Europe is pressing for the completion of negotiations on a Caribbean Economic Partnership agreement by 2007. It believes that the completion of a CSME embracing all regional ACP partners with a wide range of supporting measures is a pre-requisite for the full integration of the Caribbean into the global trading system. Regarding the DR, being significantly larger than any other nation in the region – save Haiti and Cuba – presents unique problems for its economic integration with a region beset with difficulties relating to the incorporation of the smaller but culturally homogeneous states of the Eastern Caribbean. The DR, with its enormous potential, is seen as a competitor and an economic threat. Despite this, the DR has sound economic, development and trade reasons to want to be within Caricom. Dominican Foreign Relations Minister Carlos Morales Troncoso has suggested the nation’s interest “to negotiate with the European Union as a truly unified bloc solidly grounded in common rules”. However, the DR is in a better position than most other regional nations to make use of the opportunities that an EPA with Europe will offer, but to take the fullest advantage of new trade arrangements it needs a deeper relationship with Caricom. Europe considers that DR membership of Caricom will have political, economic and functional advantages. The European Commission and the EU member states think that the DR’s economic and political weight, its culture, its security and stability, as well as that of the region, would be enhanced by a closer relationship with Caricom and would add value to the region’s relationship with Europe. Yet to be determined is whether there is any political will in Caricom to integrate the DR. A disadvantage is that the DR has not yet done enough to assure its smaller Caribbean neighbors that it truly understands their problems, fragility and natural concern about a vastly larger neighbor with a different culture, political system, and at times, alternative business norms. Jessops believes that most of the Caricom member nations are not ready for a closer relationship with the DR and suggested that the DR should take a longer term view, recognizing that the region is not ready for a widening of the integration process and seek to chart an independent way forward that will make it necessary over time for Caricom to dock with the DR. He stated that despite Caricom’s fragmented nature, there are significant opportunities for cross investment, joint ventures and partnerships with some of the region’s larger companies. A vital step would be for the DR to make a statement at the highest level setting out in detail the nation’s vision of how a closer relationship might bring value to the English-speaking part of the region, as well as to the DR. Jessops concluded by saying that the challenge for the DR – as a relatively successful market economy significantly larger than those of the English-speaking nations – is for it to identify practical ways to engage in a manner that enables relationships within the region and with Europe to grow and for all to prosper.