 cultural development foundations, emancipation panel discussion. Our theme for this year is emancipation through your eyes, tourism, politics, and economic freedom. And we first have to say this event was made possible with the assistance of Flo Baywalk Shopping Mall and of course NTN. With me I have a wonderful panelist and I'm going to introduce them starting with Mr. Ember Charles. Mr. Ember Charles has served as the executive director of the Focke Research Center for the last decade, providing leadership in cultural administration research and documentation and was part of a regional NGO movement for more than 15 years. He was the managing director of the Eastern Caribbean Telecommunications Authority from 2008 to 2017, which has responsibility for the regulation of the telecommunications environment in the five member states of the Commonwealth of Dominica, Grenada, San Nives, San Lucia, and San Vincent and the Grenadines. Before this, Mr. Charles served as the director of information services in the government of San Lucia and was the communication advisor and public awareness consultant with the OECS. He's a graduate of the University of the West Indies with a degree in communication and social sciences and regulation and policy with relation to communication telecommunication. He also possesses a master's in philosophy and developmental studies from the University of Sussex. He has written on many aspects of Caribbean life, including cultural development, media, electronic communications, as well as the Creole language. Welcome, sir, and we are very happy to have you here with us. Our next panelist is, sorry, we have so many wonderful persons here, I'm just looking for... Yes, Mr. Preville. Very happy to have you here soon. Mr. Preville is the permanent secretary with the Department of Commerce, Business Development, Industry, Enterprise Development, and Consumer Affairs. Prior to his reappointment to that ministry, he served as the PS in the Department of Labor, a position he assumed in March 2015 until July 2016. He has also previously served as the PS of the Ministry of Commerce, Business Development, Investment, and Consumer Affairs between June 2007, October 2009, and June 2012 to March 2015. He has also been the permanent secretary in the Ministry of Tourism and Civil Aviation from November 2009 to June 2015. He has had a long career as a public servant. He began in 1984 as an Information Officer with the Government Information Services. In 1990, he was appointed Chief Information Officer and at the time attained a postgraduate diploma in mass communication from the Caribbean Institute of Mass Communications at Monocampus in New England. He also has a degree in economics and management from the University of the West Indies. He completed his master's in economics in 1995 and served as an economist in the Ministry of Planning until December 1996. He's also served with the St. Lucia Air and Seaport Authorities as the Director of Economics and Research. He returned to the public service in 2001 and was assigned in 2002 to the Ministry of Commerce as the Director of Commerce and Industry until 2005. And then he was appointed Deputy Permanent Secretary and then Permanent Secretary. Within his time as Permanent Secretary in the Ministry of Tourism and Civil Aviation, he served as a Board Member of the St. Lucia Tourist Board, LIAT and Chairman of the Finance Committee of the Civil Aviation based in Antigua. He's also a tutor and has tutored many different courses with the University of the West Indies open campus from micro and macroeconomics to quantitative methods and managerial economics. We are very happy to have you here. Welcome sir. And of course we have with us Ms. Tyler Lagont. She is an independent political economic analyst and commentator and she's an alumni from the American University of Paris. She attained graduate honors and a bachelor's degree in International Economics and International and Comparative Politics. Her two highly reviewed political thesis have been published and they center on Caribbean political and economic influences and her participation she has participated in quite a number of college discussions and political forums focusing on economics. Ms. Lagont was recognized in 2015 as the most honorable speaker in the Harvard International MUN conference for the United Nations Council on Economics and Social Development. She continues to participate in international youth panel discussions and UN assemblies and remains an active commentator and an analyst through economic think tanks such as the ECON one and EFRG right yes and she's done all of this and she's only 24 years old yeah. She started her career eight years ago with Helu Incorporated a fashion company engaging in trade and medium-scale manufacturing and as the lead administrative assistant she has ensured that the business relationships procurement sales and investments in mass manufacturing machinery was very successful from 2009 to 2013 and she has recently returned to this post. She has also been involved in carnival tourism and cultural developments through her executive membership to the Tabu Carnival Band and their associate membership with the Solution Carnival Band Association. We welcome you thank you for being here and finally we have with us Mr. Kathapath Didier an economist by profession and with a BA and certification from many universities. Mr. Didier was employed by the Rodney Bay Marina for 25 years 12 of those as the general manager. He was instrumental in sourcing investors and coordinating the sale of the marina to Island Capital Group of the United States. After the sale of the marina he rebeined until 2009 when first sold in 2006. He has completed several tourism and yachting related consultancies for the Caribbean Hotel and Tourism Association, the United Nations as well as regional agencies. Among those were groundbreaking yachting economic impact studies in 2001 and 2002 for eight Caribbean Islands. In addition he has completed the first hotel tax impact study in 16 Caribbean Islands in 2005 and has published numerous management articles in Yachting World and Marina World. In 2015 Mr. Didier completed a new yachting survey for the EU and presented his findings at the EU forum in Russell's in 2016. He has served as the director of the St. Lucia Tourist Board and currently serves on the boards of the Souffre Marine Management Association, Tapio Hospital, the St. Lucia Tourism Board, Radio St. Lucia and the Foundation for Development of Caribbean Children. As a former maritime consultant with the Ministry of Tourism, Heritage and Creative Industries, Mr. Didier was charged with implementing the policy and strategy for the further development of yachting and water-based tourism and that consultancy position he had from 2009 to 2017. Welcome and thank you for being here with us. So we have quite a distinguished group of panelists here and we are very happy and excited to hear what it is that they are going to impart on us with regards to our theme. What we're going to do right now in relation to the theme that I mentioned earlier, I'm going to read a short blurb on what inspired the theme and then I'm going to ask each panelist to give their thoughts on it. Again, the theme is emancipation through your eyes, tourism, politics and economic freedom. Our very existence hinges on elements of our work ethic, identity, language, economy, the way we live, our communities looking at what has made us what we are today. Thus building and transforming our nation into a place where we can celebrate our past while working towards building a future. As a nation we are on the brink of an economic revolution that brings to the fray the balancing act of our independence and dependence on colonial structures, on new systems that resemble the all ideologies of a distant past. Quite a lot there to mull over and I'm going to ask Mr. Charles to be the first one to share his musins you know on this topic. Thank you very much. I'm a very cautious opening batsman so I won't need a four of the bats but just to see I find the the topic in particular poses some stark contract contradictions. When you speak about economic freedom and you tag tourism to it, one begs the question to what extent can tourism as our major industry provide a platform for economic freedom for people. Tourism is a sector which is linked to the global economy. We know of the vulnerabilities of the tourism sector. We know of the potential as well but at the same time if it is the sector that has to determine the priorities for our people then clearly we have to think the extent to which it is integrated into other sectors in our economy and our society. The other major question we have to ask ourselves is how does an economic sector determine or influence our political structures, our political decisions and our political leaders for that matter. So I think these are the big questions that come before us and it's even more poignant now within the context of emancipation. Does that present the platform for thinking that we are in emancipated people? That's my opening comment. Thank you. Thank you Mr. Charles. Yes, go ahead sir. Mr. Preville. Given the opportunity but yeah like him but my preliminary comments that the topic itself is very contradictory but very very dynamic. We think of emancipation and we think of colonization and we think of emancipation and we think of independence. My initial comments are that a country, a state like ours, small and open because everything in life is relative and for a small country like St. Lucia what does independence mean and what value do you really have as an independent country? So for me I approached that topic by saying to myself that independence is the right that a nation's state has to decide for itself. It is also the right to decide to be dependent. So for me the notion of words like independence are synonymous with words like emancipation and I look at that in the context of a small economy that by virtue of its openness will always be interdependent. So the issue now is how does a country that will always be interdependent exercise independence and how do you carve out an independence posture in a very today interdependent world. So these are my thoughts as we begin to talk. Now I should mention as we go forward that the first half of this session we will of course have here from our different panelists we'll have a discussion and then we will then open the floor to you our audience. I'll be very happy to have you here with us today. Now before we go to Ms. Largo let me again say thank you to Baywalk Shop in Mall to the Cultural Development Foundation flow as well as NTN for allowing this and I think it's a very important discussion as you can see so far some very interesting ideas and thoughts are coming through. Now I know that I'm sure you have some interesting thoughts to add to this so let's go ahead. I think obviously be it that we're approaching Emancipation Day and the likes it's very important that we do focus on the question of where we are today vis a vis where we were a couple years ago when we were on the brink of Emancipation fighting the colonial struggle etc. So now that we're looking at tourism which is important in this in the dead center of our economy an economy linked to politics it does beg the question and we know that a lot of persons are of the opinion that our tourism industry is like enslavement. Let's let's get that on the table that most persons do assume that we have the likes of our own Derek Walker mentioned in his poetry the illusion of our own economy being the same cycle of enslavement and being dependent on the foreign on the foreign European power. So this of course probes my thinking into how far into tourism are we exactly going is our country just focused on hotel tourism or are we looking into other sectors which is also very important and I think that that should be a leading question moving forward in how we approach the topic of Emancipation tourism politics and economics. Thank you very much Mr. Didier. Very interesting set of words crafted together tourism politics economic freedom very timely based on the narrative the prevailing narrative for the last six months some of the challenges with the potential investment opportunities and hard decisions. When I think of tourism I think of 1492 maybe that was our first tourism was it invasion or investment politics when I think of politics I think of two Latin words poly antics many bloodsuckers and economic freedom might be a bit of an illusion in this global dispensation because we do have the new colonialists that are knocking on our doors so very timely these three words but as a nation to really have an open discussion the narrative must change and the narrative must first start with the politicians because that is where the art of governance comes from so three powerful words well crafted together and I must say timely for emancipation. Thank you very much quite a bit here to give you some food for thought to start to think and to help you we're going to take a short break right now so think of some of the things that have come up we talked about integration the contradictory nature of our topic we talked about what does independence really mean was it an invasion what did you say investment or invasion the whole idea of it being an illusion so well we what is it some interesting ideas coming up so as I said we'll be back after a very short break to continue the discussion the St. Lucia National Trust we champion the conservation of sensitive and priceless national assets your membership is valuable to us in supporting and influencing the policymakers and developers to conserve our environment rescue St. Lucia come partner with the St. Lucia National Trust today emancipation panel discussion and so far we've had some very thought-provoking ideas thrown out at us from our panelists and to start the discussion off we're going to look at our economists next to me here Mr. Kepha Dede to give a few thoughts based on what his fellow panelists have said. Well I'm really intrigued by and it's refreshing to have the different angles but I want to focus on the word emancipation because it screams of freedom and the act of being free and I want us to really look ourselves in the mirror as a nation are we truly free and when I say free are we truly free in the term of a sovereign nation are we free to make decisions in this global imperative I want to give a snapshot our economy is in challenging times the American in America who ganja is on its way to being legal and is being sold and dispensed for medical purposes yet still the great USA comes down in helicopters and tells us what to do with the very thing that's free in their country so are we really free to make decisions as a sovereign nation tourism haven't been in that sector for a long time it's I think all of us in the Caribbean suffer from a schizophrenia and tourism we seem to think that the foreigner is going to come and save us with foreign direct investment we don't seem to seize the opportunity to invest in ourselves it is it's it's an open tap to give concessions to these masses that are coming with a new dispensation I don't say master I use the word master because I think tourism may be the new plantations on the beach the way I see it based on the prevailing narrative and it may be a time for us as Negema was to really seize the opportunity as and really cherish that freedom of our history the whole colonialism the whole the vibrance of Reagan rastafarism and look at us as small states with unique opportunities to remain ourselves but unique I am not so sure the brick-and-matter building huge monstrosities monstrosities on the beach is really an industry and it might be actually a dilemma as we move forward so it's timely because of the narrative but we're having this discussion not really being free yes sir I see mr. Privil reaching for his mic yes sir let's hear your comments I have a slight of a different approach to him in terms of how you perceive tourism I think there are some realities we have to face and these are the things that that we need to confront with as a small country first of all I think as a nation we need to decide what we are who we are and I don't think we've had many many opportunities for us to to actually agree what we are as a people and I believe the most important thing for any country is deciding what your values are what it is you stand for what it is you will not stand for it doesn't mean you may get away with what you want but you at least define for yourself what you believe I don't know we have done that and I don't know we teach that in our schools to to to the extent that we have solutions who know what it means to be solution because if you don't know where you are and who you are then you get lost in the maze of things around you and other people around you and you might be intimidated by tourism but the intimidation perhaps comes about comes about because you don't know so we need to have our value system clear we need to have a sense of our norms and our history and we need to also have some idea as to where we want to go and then we need to decide we need to look at ourselves and look at our constraints and then decide what we will help us get to where we are retaining what and who we are now the truth is our country has been always from slavery we were founded on a basis of international trade slavery was a form was international trade first then we followed that up with sugar and in the case of Senusia bananas and maybe cocoa to a lesser extent again engaged in international trade we followed that up with and in parallel we developed tourism because tourism didn't come on all of a sudden if you look at the GDP figures of our country and I went I took some time to go through it you will realize that tourism has always been somewhere between it and now a lot higher in terms of percentage of GDP now I'll just take two minutes because I need to say these things from 1995 to 2015 that's 20 years if you look in 1995 agriculture constituted about 10.58% of GDP in 2000 it was 6.4 in 2005 it fell to 3.66 2010 3.33 and in 2015 1.9% of GDP agriculture has been on the decline tourism 10.62% in 2000 and in 1995 11.88% 2013 point 63% 2000 and I'm fine and it has remained about that in this period what has happened to our country in terms of our economic growth in to in 1995 our country was growing at 7.4% a year remember agriculture was 10.58 tourism was 10.62 when we get to 2000 we had negative growth agriculture 6.4 tourism 11.88 I fast forward so we're now in 2011 agriculture is 1.9% tourism 10.9 GDP growth 2% what is unemployment like in 1995 our level of unemployment was 15.9% in 2016.5 in 2005 18.7 in 2010 20.6 in 2015 24.1 now so we have a country we have an economic activity the economic activity is primarily an international trade activity is it addressing our growth rate the data says no is it addressing unemployment the data says no so the question now becomes is this the vehicle now I will say when I look around me I cannot put my finger on another vehicle but I will also say perhaps the reason why that vehicle is not doing what we wanted to do lies with us not the industry out external to us but us are we prepared do we want to put in systems and structures to make it work for us the industry is vertically integrated it is becoming increasingly vertically integrated so the person who owns the accommodation now wants to own the tours now wants to own the taxi now if that is the model that we will base our country's future on I think we will have a problem so for me there is need for us to decide if we want to make that industry work and I say now our options are limited there must be horizontal integration thank you okay thank you mr. Privil I saw miss Lagor shaking her hair the while this was going on so thank you have some comments you might want to add to that I'm really disagree yes mr. Privil has some very strong points that I do agree with and just to take off from from that and look at it in a more global perspective as he did say our agricultural industry was on the decline while we tend to put more efforts into into tourism tourism now as he said he's not too sure if it's the right vehicle but I do want to look at the approach as well as a nucious placement in the in the global in in competitiveness in tourism competitiveness and where we stand and where we ought to be first of all for the Caribbean on a wider scale from the UNWWTO organization they highlight that from 1990 to 2015 increases in tourism for the Caribbean they have been slow and steady so we go from 11% international arrivals to 23% in this in the span of say 20 years almost and that's just 12% growth in income from tourism so we need to look at how much that is bringing to us and why that is the case and that for me would have to be that we're too focused on hotel tourism there are many aspects of tourism that we need to look into but there's just been a focus on the Sun and sea sort of destination which is on the decline and rightfully so it is on a decline because times are changing and we need dynamic structures structures that are able to flex with the coming age we have we have the growth of the millennials millennials tend to be independent persons and when you study their behavioral habits and travel patterns they tend to not use hotels they use the Airbnb they don't want to go according to various store given tour guides etc they want to do it on their own they hire what you call Uber which is you know your taxi services to here and back so if this is the new age of of persons coming into being and being economically active then the platform that we're trying to still invest in we're still investing in hotels we're still investing in in the cruise tourism that is not technically helping us and it would and to add to that point the UN have the UNWTO they have set an agenda and they're focusing for 2030 to incorporate more cultural tourism cultural and entertainment tourism which is something that we need to look into Trinidad has been flourishing for years with their carnival their carnival tourism which brings in thousands in a short space of time you have other islands benefiting from sports tourism as well as Senusia did have jazz which is being revamped but we need to look at how it's being revamped at this critical point to ensure that in the future we do not fall back because tourism is not necessarily the wrong vehicle but we're probably in the wrong gear we need to change it up a bit and look at different focuses because the one we have now is definitely on the decline with the new age of tourists that is coming about thank you very much for those comments now I see mr. Charles and looks ready to say his but what you ask him to wait just one minute because you're going to go to a quick quick break and when we come back we will start off with you I'm so fed up with my 14 year old child she's driving me crazy I just don't know what to do all I need is some good leaks to wake up Alice ignore the counseling pants is given government employees have free access to professional counseling services under the employee assistance program known as EAP EAP EAP what's that oh no mirror telling people my business listen to me Alice I was struggling with my child I made an appointment to see an EAP counselor and I was very satisfied with the service that I received and you know what up to a day like today my information remains confidential coax how come nobody in the office knew anything about your counseling that's because EAP counselors they work on the strict clauses of confidentiality I know you know what confidential means EAP providing professional counseling services how much is it girl the counseling is free free for you free for your child and you know what your information remains confidential call the EAP unit at the ministry of the public service telephone number 468 2269 for more information EAP works let it work for you and we are back and mr. Charles is raring to go with his comments mr. Charles the floor is yours thank you very much I think these were excellent presentations by the three other panelists but irrespective of the economic activity you decide to embark on whether it's tourism agriculture the key question is to what extent it integrates everybody because you can have a situation and we're going to be getting to see it now where our major economies have been controlled economic activities controlled by monopolies what choices do people have and choices determine the extent to which you are free to move from one point to another to make any kind of economic activity so tourism as a main economic activity I think of button and Titus made the point the extent to which it is vertically integrated which is I think a very dangerous trend for us to be taking however when you when you Titus presented some statistics about what's happening in the economy the as far as economic freedom is concerned Saint Lucia is actually ranked very high in the region as a country that enjoys economic freedom but this is based purely on statistics because you have a tight tourism sector now which brings in revenue most of it goes out but at the same time you have high levels of unemployment you have tremendous social activities and social disturbances taking place because people are unemployed because people can feel satisfied you have cases where the education is being driven by the major economic activity so everybody's saying now you should teach everybody about tourism what's about your life skills what about your sense of identity what's about ensuring that solutions always feel proud when they go overseas to be called solutions and to call themselves solutions but if you are in a situation where the economic activity keeps strangling your country and the benefits going just to one set of people then clearly you can't talk about emancipation being emancipated you can't talk about economic freedom in a real sense statistically can work because you can have the figures to show that the country has earned so much revenue over a period of time but does it filter does it cause other homegrown activities to take place and owned by ordinary Saint Lucia tours now are being owned and operated by the companies who own the infrastructure who own the transportation who own other sectors of the of the tourism sector and the way it is structured is very difficult for a small entrepreneur to get in involved in that kind of activity because you set all sorts of parameters and rules so it is the it is incumbent upon the state and the government now to ensure in the rules it sets that you do not exclude people but it's highly inclusive thank you I see mr. DDA yes bang on bang on and I'll tell you why when I think of emancipation I obviously have to reference slavery slavery was an interruption to a great history an interruption I am not defined by slavery it was an interruption therefore to go to ember's point I want to focus on the politics because that's where feeds in our governance the people we elect to form governments and to shape our destiny and our vision must have a clear sense of the psyche of Saint Lucia and we must be first so I am a bit perturbed and disturbed that a cabinet of ministers are the ones authorized to give concessions I would prefer there was a checklist qualification and a way of measuring it and that's the danger to me personally as an economist for this wave of tourism because really and truly as ember said and to a certain extent tightest whichever industry you focus on the priority and the vision and the passion and the leadership must come from our political leaders whether it's tourism whether it's manufacturing whether it's agriculture whether it's creative arts I'll give an example reggae music there isn't a ministry of reggae music in Jamaica it's worldwide Bob Marley I dare anybody to quantify the economic value to GDP that reggae music brings in it can't be captured but it's worldwide so it's not necessary shaping a structure and an industry but for us as a people's shaping a psyche that is unique to Saint Lucia that we can then export and that people come to consume that's the type of tourism I am tired of the bricks and mortar on the beach I am tired of these vertical integration that one brand look at what's happening in the Caribbean look at what's happening in Tiga look at what's happening in Trinidad where one brand controls the government so we need to start as a people focus make sure that the leaders we put in there understands our psyche and puts us as a nation and as a people first thank you a lot has been coming out from your comments about identity and the whole idea of we taking ownership and you've brought up a point here that we should start off with our leaders the politicians should be the ones to lead this any the rest any thoughts on that miss miss Lago the thoughts on identity and the reason that I think that it is so difficult to be captured in Saint Lucia is that we're so used to as one of my fellow panellists said earlier we have a history of international trade and going after the commu commercial and what we have come we've come to a point where in in light of citizenship investment programs we've come to the void to the point where we've also commercialized our sovereignty and that is a political problem that we have to deal with where persons are given the option to buy citizenship into a country so at that point we start to decrease our value to attract foreign investment we're we're selling ourselves short at that point so what happens then is that persons are the law no longer upholds for the foreigner who's coming with the money the money that we so need there's the the taxes do not apply to them either and all of that falls the bird onto the burden of the people so we need to put out we need to stand up to our governments and have them not sell us short we're actually becoming whitewashed we're losing our identity we're losing our culture to become an quote-unquote a standard commodity on a shelf and that's where the issue comes in so if we start to advocate when solutions are more forefront with with being in charge of the of the different industries etc or the different businesses then we would definitely have a foot in in reclaiming our identity a lot of the time we go to say that for instance the hotel industries are owning the touring services etc but that is in the hotel brand they are they do sell their cell from being all-inclusive they sell one thing money doesn't change hands it just stays within themselves so we need to fight that and as I said move away from the Sun and sea tourism which is hotels along the beachfront and start to move into other forms of tourism like cover did say whether it be entertainment whether it be culture more important in culture which we invite which we awakens our identity if we do so then we will definitely be on the route to making to making amends and fixing our okay thank you mr. Charles one of the the factors we have to realize is the nature of the relationship between the politics and the economic sector of our countries our leaders are largely influence sometimes dictated by sometimes instructed by the major economic sectors so if we were a very strong agricultural economy that lobby would be determining who became our political leaders when it became the manufacturing sector now it is tourism and you could you could see the relationship I think our big biggest disappointment in recent times has been the the underdevelopment of our civil society of our NGO sectors there was a time we were very we were flourishing with NGOs and some it was probably some imploding or self-destruction but if we fail to pay attention to civil society we'll be caught in this morass for a very long time and when you see this change it comes out of civil society the climate change movements the movement for human rights the movement for innovation all the disruption comes from civil society and if we know this don't disrupt our society will remain static and we'll be talking about the same problem perhaps in the next 20 years but is now speaking how I want to speak because you see I started off by saying if you don't know who you are if you don't have a value system you just become a wishy-washy and the truth of the matter is that when I leave St. Lucian I go to Rome I am not looking for anything from Russia I'm not looking for anything from St. Lucia I'm looking for something from Rome so there must be something that is authentically Rome that I will that's why I go there so if St. Lucia and St. Lucia's who live in St. Lucia are not sure that they have something of value that the world needs or once then you can then you are nothing that actually the tourists will not want to come to see your country or your people they will go to a brick and mortar structure so what really makes in my view if the industry called tourism and if this country is going to be based on tourism what is its trend is actually making St. Lucia and St. Lucia's more authentic not less authentic more authentic if our values can stand out more if our way of life can stand out more if our creativity can stand out more people will want to come to see you that's why they come here to see the pitons because they care find it where else it is authentic St. Lucia so my view and anybody's making the point if we don't understand that what if it's tourism that will drive tourism has to do about us we will have missed the game and secondly this country has no forum where people talk there is no forum where people sit and discuss anything the Guild of graduates I don't know the other forms of the community the spots and cultural clubs all the things that are supposed to nurture a sense of who you are at this functional so we have a real existential problem as a country and then you add to that the issue of citizenship by investment you have a real issue so I think this country is at a point and I think in your preamble you say we are an economic crossroads I think it's more than economic we are at a point where as a nation state we need to find who we are and we need to create for us to enforce who we are if we don't do that we'll be having a discussion about us and Lucia that will be something you won't be able to put your hand on very very soon but while we need the discussion it has to also go the other route those that seek to govern us must seek consultation with us and that's very important but I want to say I want to say this on that I believe I believe that a country gets the government it deserves I believe if people don't know who they are on what they stand for they will do whatever it is you see so the change in the political leadership will only come about because the politicians don't come out of outside of us they come from within us so it's there we have to get the values there to get the kind of leaders we want point taken but whoever we vote must understand that before they make decisions behind that door called cabinet they must consult there must be an intense level of consultation and I'm agreeing with you we we get the government we deserve but the election doesn't stop by winning and our destiny is not shaped within five years that is a short vision you must consult us because when you start to do things that will have an impact for the next 50 40 years it's serious this is not a short run like run life and going back I don't think the choice is between necessarily agriculture tourism manufacturing I think the choice is between within ourselves as a people to have articulate a vision you know it's funny we celebrate not Nobel laureate you know Sa'afah Lewis's thesis has never been discussed apart from a lecture to celebrate just around his birthday do we recognize we keep comparing ourselves to Taiwan but you know what Taiwan only studied they executed his thesis we keep comparing ourselves to all the Singapore they didn't just study and discuss they executed and here's a guy we build monuments we put him on our money but ask any child in a school about Sa'afah Lewis and his thesis investment by invitation and areas where we can craft strong economies it's not even discussed ask all the leaders who we've elected shot of one Lewis what's after Lewis thesis is about they can't answer you and you know that's what I'm talking about concept because any person who wins a seat and goes into government does not know everything he is he or she's not an expert all of a sudden not everything so he can't fashion my my destiny and I have a problem with that so when we talk in emancipation apart from economic freedom I want the freedom as a citizen to tell him he's wrong Mr. Charles you want to add to that just to support cut but because it's really about freedom of thought freedom to think for ourselves very often I'll give a very simple example any of you go to an establishment and somebody takes your ID and goes to the back to photocopies never asked you any questions I said but you can't photocopy my ID you must get my consent to copy my ID then they tell you it's that's the policy there's no policy that you can copy my ID I must give you permission to copy my ID but the point of making you that illustration is that we are so terrified of thinking for ourselves because of what we lose we think that we are top of the line so if they were asked to go back and talk to a manager they will miss our turn at the line I will miss some crumbs on the under the table so we do not we do not use that privilege to think for ourselves and exercise that freedom of thought and too often this sort of multiplies and it becomes our being after a while that's you know okay I won't bother with this somebody spelled your name wrong you try to explain to them my name is spelled with an E not an I or whatever then you you get into some problems down the road because they didn't listen to you and again you were so not so fussy you didn't bother emphasize or stick to your point that my name must be spelled with an E or else and I think if we not doing these things we're not emancipated as yet thank you mr. mr. Charles I think and I'm seeing persons reaching for their mic which means this is really pulling out of you some comments that you'd like to share with us but we have to take a quick break and so when we come back we start with you with the pre-built mmm some belty shop any very pretty hello how are you good day how may I be of assistance I'm looking for some weaker items yes some hats some bags and perhaps some table mats you have any of those I'm so sorry but we don't have any straw mats however we do have some local porcupices if you don't have any I say about what I don't know anyone who's producing this musicians designers dancers crafters writers have you taken action to put yourself or your business on the map the Ministry of Tourism Heritage and creative industries and the Cultural Development Foundation have launched the cultural mapping project so we can map it to tap it the cultural map will identify and promote our cultural and arts resources making it easier for people to do business with you as well as health development agencies and government understand the needs of the industry so who should register all traditional and contemporary individual artist groups cultural organizations creative businesses events historical and cultural sites resource centers training facilities promoters managers service providers who work in arts culture and creative industry to get yourself mapped head over to the Cultural Development Foundation at Barnard Hill in Cass Street today or download the Android app from the Google Play Store it's our culture map it to tap it look out for a team map it in your community and finally and welcome back to our emancipation panel discussion and just to remind you our theme is emancipation through your eyes tourism politics and economic freedom and we're getting into what really that means was the underlying issues and when we left Mr. Privil you had some comments you wanted to share just just some comments based on what ember said I believe that having said everything I've said about tourism and how I think it should work there are there is need for us to even in looking at the topic I saw it was going but we need to think a little bit beyond even tourism I think sometimes we we say agriculture tourism manufacturing but the world has moved on and there's something called information and communication technology there there and what has always been concerned in this great country called St. Lucia is intellectual capacity and I think there are so many brilliant young girls and boys in this country if ideas that we're not capturing those ideas and I think we are not we do not have an education system that that is able to take ideas and nurture and grow I work in the Ministry of Commerce and I I know the responsibility of taking ideas and making enterprises out of them rest with our ministry and even there there's so many constraints to make it really happen and I think these these are some of the things that have kept us less emancipated I believe for instance young people with a cell phone should be engaged in doing distribution online network marketing earning income from home there are so many things that we're not really doing I think there are opportunities beyond the strict rubric of tourism agriculture manufacturing but with respect to the tourism centric thing and the politics that comes into this I think politicians are constrained many a time when they get into office by conflicting demands but there is another demand that is really hurting our politicians and maybe they said they said the standard by how they appeal to people to vote the dependency syndrome created between the politician and the electorate that I must need you to survive you know any great government a great political party would want to see its people become less dependent on government and less dependent on individual politicians so if you look at our country over the years our people have grown increasingly dependent on the politician and not less and if that has happened it tends to you our emancipation has not really happened as yet all right now with these words and I see the reactions here among our panelists and Wallace has been going on I've been hearing the little comments from our audience let's just take this moment to say that we are opening up to the audience to make comments or questions if you look to your right there's a cap there is a mic there you make your way to the mic and will allow you to share your comments or ask any questions so please just and don't be shy just go up to the mic I see a hand up so yes ma'am I think this is a fascinating subject a few things that I need to mention first of all history are like voices of the past that repeat themselves and the patterns that I'm seeing in Solution are not really paying attention to the youth that is really knocking on our door and telling us to listen one of the things that I'm a solution and I have choices to go other places on vacation but I'm home I'm home every summer and one of the things that I do when I come here speak to the market vendors they are the ones that are part of the tourism product that have been cut out of tourism I speak to the youth and the things that they tell me is that oh no tourism isn't for me I get nothing from it so when you talk about emancipation you'll have to look at in emancipation of the people and not emancipation relevant to the structures that represent their voices because I think politics has killed St. Lucia and has killed our youth our youths are like wild grass with no leadership you're Mr. Percival was saying we need to find out what our identity is it's always been there it's never left us I think the politicians have moved away from it and one of the things that they need to start doing is going back to the people in the United States what has happened right now is that movements are now growing because the politicians are no longer listening and the same thing is happening to St. Lucia we need to have movements we need to have new leadership we need to have people who listen to the people who listen to the youth to find out entrepreneurship efforts it doesn't always have to be tourism other sectors can come in that alliances and linkages with tourism but I think the idea of just agriculture and tourism is old and passé and we need to start thinking of other structures and other industries that can help the people of St. Lucia thank you very much yes go ahead sir it's a very good point we're talking about emancipation but we're still enslaved politically we become a very tribal society so we cannot have economic freedom when the red and yellow the red lackeys get the work when the yellow is in power the yellow lackeys get the work so the youth on the block is cut off the youth the young lady who works in a bank would like to go and study in Holland who doesn't have a very exclusive surname can't get it completely cut up and you need to have a political godfather so we have this economic freedom thing is an illusion because we become enslaved within the politics and it should be this is wrong political parties of vehicle to good governance when they get there they need to govern for all St. Lucia and dash with this red and yellow nonsense that we keep promoting it's just killing us thank you yes yes just to add on to what covered did say and be it that I've gone through similar experiences in being a recent graduate the the point brought up that we it's a repeat of a cycle of us being enslaved again there was always of there's also a break from that slavery and I do want to comment that not all the youth are brainwashed at this point by the red and yellow I can't speak for all but I would like to say that I'm speaking for those that I do know that are educated that are looking beyond the colors and looking out at what is being offered we recently had elections in 2016-15 from correct and there was an internet movement to to stop the youth from voting there were articles published telling other other youth members to not vote because we are not being offered enough information enough insight on what we are going to be get what we are going to be getting out of the election so you could already see that there is a resistance to what is happening and persons are disregarding the grand elder approach where you know it is said that tourism is the way and agriculture is the way persons are making their own avenues when you when you realize that a lot of the youth now are educated they hold bachelor's degrees master's degrees and they're not getting work they're starting to create their own we see in the flourishing of of young designers how many persons here do know that there are that there are more than three in the beginning eight years ago it was probably one or two young persons designing now we have a collect we have a collective of persons getting into swimwear and as a carnival material which is which is already being looked at by people to help export their product so solutions are at least the youth are taking the reins of the horse and they trying to lead their own way so I won't say that there is beginning to be a break from that the persons who need to look into that as the older persons disregarding the youth because there's a continual disregard oh they know what they're doing they're gonna fall and they're gonna realize it later let them do that we need to change that focus and actually listen to what they're saying and see what of it makes sense and harness that grow that and treat that as as something thank you our audience members spoke about breaking patterns and it sounds like you're saying that the youth now are doing some of that because we keep talking about the way things are do you see or are you saying that maybe that emancipation is happening but now the younger generation it is a form of emancipation but when you have a small collective doing it it just looks like a resistance to the system and then they you still and ends up being labeled as the troublemakers we need to see why they are rebelling what is the root of the rebellion why persons no longer want to work I know a few persons who have on their own left jobs because they said this is not for me I'm gonna stay on my own struggle be it but I would try to make my own way and they are doing that in the creative industries which is why we've seen you know the new formation of the creative industries and more attention being paid to that so we need to pay more attention to that definitely and we could find a way forward music entertainment culture there is a way for it we just need to focus on that yes gentlemen anyone wants to make a comment on was sorry let's hold on to that go ahead sir afternoon yeah emancipation we know if emancipation there was compensation paid to the planters the Africans who never compensated I would like the panelists to speak on what they understand what they think about the role of reparations in terms of economic freedom on the whole and also for African people in St. Lucia all right thank you would like to reparation my views might be very very left I don't believe in reparations I don't believe anybody owns me anything in life I believe where I am is where I am and where I am I move from where I am I believe if I'm going to wait for Europe I know the history I know what was done to us I cannot undo that what I have to do is to move forward so I am not waiting for any form of reparation I do however recognize that when you talk about reparations sometimes we see reparation as an economic if you look at an accounting structure you would see if you put reparation there and someone gives you whatever millions whatever it is they give you a one-time lump sum so here is your reparation share it among you finish if you I'm not interested in that I'm more interested in engaging the people who through their efforts in the past have me here engaging them in a manner that gives me not a one-time payment but a future of continuous income meaning I engage you we work we trade and I get my reparation that way I mean I'm more interested in sitting down with you and saying here are the areas I want you to work with me in my economy on different areas that's why I get my reparation but reparation as a payment not interested well I'm really right in the reparation thing slavery was an interruption to a great great great great dynasty and who knows so not only should you write a check but you should review WTO and everything else that prevents us as a sovereign nation that built your European when I went to Brussels and Belgium and I walked around and I saw these structures clattered with gold and the seat of the EU and all the the obnoxious wealth these guys didn't mind that in in Belgium they took it from us our ancestors so everybody pays homage to the Jewish Holocaust and and the Jews have been able to be respected all around what about what happened to the African Holocaust so sorry I can't forget that maybe as you say we need to review the whole system so that the young people here not only should you will be a choice but we should be able to go to school in the EU in Europe to the best schools have a level playing field because yes intellectually we might be small but we can challenge them but we obviously do not have the resources and the reason we do not have the resources because we work for 400 years and build their great nation so sorry I'm right on the reparation Mr. Charles your comments please I don't want to repeat comments but just for the record I'm also right yes I see we have another audience member comments yes okay when I came to the mic I was trying to comment on comment made by one of the panelists about the disconnect between the political leadership or systems and and say what the youth want or or the society and I've heard that being said so many times in many different places we talk about the political tribalism and all of that but we need to speak on the solution side how do we remedy that situation we have a system where political groups or parties or whatever you wish to call them select our leaders based on an internal calculation a calculation that makes sense to a group for an objective of their own which may be to win a parliamentary majority but that does not that the decision calculus is not based on governance which is really why we select governments ultimately so when that group for want of a better word wins an election then the discussion or decision about governance which is really why we actually let them come to the fore and then we end up with a situation where there's that disconnect you talk about where our leadership seemed not to be in step because we didn't debate we didn't ask them what they brought what is their legitimacy for leadership we did nothing like that but when the horses bolted we seem to now want to care about why but we should have asked those questions before and before I leave the mic I want to say institutions matter we have to create the regulatory framework the institutions to give the outcomes we want okay there's a saying that says a country gets the systems and the leadership that it deserves so if we want to change that we need to change the process by which we select our leaders and our political leadership thank you thank you very much at this point we are going to go to a very quick break and when we come back Mr. DJ will start off with you. Family time is a healthy time and a healthy family eats smart local fish and seafood from fishermen and farmers that you trust with your family's health is always fresh choose fresh seafood because it's packed with nutrients St. Lucia's fish and seafood producers meet every government standard for health and safety high quality fresh local food products straight from the fishermen to you choose St. Lucia fish and seafood at your local grocers and choose a healthy lifestyle for your entire family I use fresh local fish right there from the fisheries department eat fresh by local St. Lucia's fishermen produce an abundance of fresh foods highly nutritious and incredibly tasty together when it's most important healthy families buy fresh eat fresh welcome back to our emancipation panel discussion and we left on the high note I saw my panelists discussing why we were at break so we're going to start off to hear some of their comments with Mr. Didier yeah I want to go back to my good friends Danny's comments about institutions I've already said that we're not free so I don't want to echo that again but there isn't an environment of truly people airing their views and being critical of institutions when you criticize your ostracize then you label and depending on who's in power you're the opposition so the only way we could in a realistic and mature way deal with these institutions is to have dialogue and I welcome this I think this is a fresh forum but look around I guess it and one politician here there's a reason why there's a reason why and I keep going the politics let's begin with the end in mind I want to be critical of these institutions and I want to write and I want to go on the talk shows but I also want to discuss because I have a point of view and I'm open to a discussion is the climate and environment ripe in St. Lucia from a pure discussion about anything whether it's an investment in the south whether it's a set of of mamas women somewhere is there a forum to do that no so yes I take your point like we should be critical of institutions but there must be an enabling environment as we we need to foster that I said a few days ago years ago we had a great mobilizer George Audlum you know sometimes I sit down and I say boy we really miss him right now we need mobilizers young and old to come forth because let's criticize but also let's put on the heat and go face-to-face and we need them more than ever before I finish off in emancipation we're celebrating emancipation and has it ever dawned on you that who are our heroes who do we celebrate who are the people that we you know apart from Sir Arthur and the same three names we are not a people that celebrate homegrown heroes whether it's Sammy whether it's the raster man doing the carving that died from a landslide we sing a calypso and we give them an OBE and God bless their soul so we not only are we not even mobilized to criticize we don't even mobilize to help one another and support each other so when we discuss this emancipation they Bob said it we have to free ourselves from this mental slavery and this political contamination I keep coming back to this politics because that is the root cause of this present slavery okay we have I think we have a member of our audience who'd like to make a comment yes hi thank you we're here discussing at a point in time which comes around every year about our emancipation and I dare say that emancipation was if you will thrust upon us because it was not on our terms and we discuss emancipation throughout history and even up to now thinking that it is just an escape from the slave plantations and Coughbert mentioned or you alluded to it and Bob Marley and we're all familiar with the mental slavery aspect of slavery and its connection with emancipation and looking at this discussion here today walking in you see that a number of seats are vacant and it seems that for many people the idea of emancipation or the discussion of our emancipation whatever that is is not sexy enough it's not immediate enough our struggles have to produce immediate results so we have the panel here discussing emancipation but how does that emancipation discussion turn into a direction into a movement into an understanding into a thinking of the people to have a meaningful or the desired result because we can go through these motions year in and year out but what we seem to fail to realize is that all the influences of slavery in whatever color shape or form that they have enslaved us over the hundreds of years still exist whether it's in the music whether it's in the fashion whether it's in business whether it's in finance all of the slavery influences still affect and have a daily influence on our lives so how do we get out of the current day slavery we recognize it but we also recognize that we are small countries we have limited economies of scale so how do we craft our exit from modern day slavery thank you very much sir mr. Charles yes I just want to respond to the comments you normally hear that we keep on talking and talking and talking talking is important if we don't talk we don't discuss we don't vent our feelings our ideas and so forth it is necessary sometimes to get some action out of the talking but that's you don't put a constraint on your your freedom to express yourself or to share your thoughts because you come to a discussion you think nothing will come out of it we encourage our systems to to develop curricula for children to ask them to question to ask them to be creative you have to be keep on doing these things over and over I mean talking if it's a strength we have in talking let's use it someday something will come out of it and revolutions don't necessarily start with large crowds you know they start with small groups terms in terms of commenting on your what do you do given where you are there is a lot we can do we have to look at ourselves in relation to our brothers and sisters there is strength in unity we have countries around us we are we are part of a collective and we see as for instance we're not doing much to build on that it's being done at a high esoteric level but these are the things that I think we can use to begin to create our interdependence among ourselves in the OECS and greater independence in terms of our economic freedom we're not working with each other much we're not doing that we are going about these things as an each island on its own what does what does that have what does that do we become even more and more vulnerable a country that is extremely vulnerable vulnerable economically socially and otherwise so there are things we can do and it begins it begins in the school it begins with the quality of the instruction the curricula it begins by making sure our kids are taught our history properly and history not necessarily in the past our modern history our about our own people the history of our own solutions the centomas and all of those people the teachers who taught us in the past these are the things we don't teach we don't celebrate each other we do not celebrate each other we try to put each other down other countries celebrate the people it is those things my brother we need to do to begin to remove the shackles and emancipate ourselves when we begin to believe in ourselves thank you we are going to have comments from Miss Lagonde we're going to go back into the audience yes just as mr. Previl said the answer is education and fine-tuning our education to be more solution and more Caribbean he brought forth an excellent point that emancipation in itself was thrusted upon us as opposed to us going forth and saying that we take it so once that they came and we emancipated what happened nothing really changed the mindset stayed and like you said the emancipation the mentally pack emancipation was not there now in order for us to move forward and to go past the talking point there needs to be a choice me but the choice cannot be made as you rightfully said if persons are don't know how to critically think about what we are discussing this is why as you said there's only a select factor of society that will come to discussions and engage in such a topic other persons will not find it sexy because they do not know about it so if we begin at the schools and we begin to re-educate introduce more solution more solution based curricula and Caribbean curricula as we spoke about on break we spoke about how the Jews were educated about the all the Holocaust they were educated about their history but what are we being educated on so I think that that is the answer to the very brilliant point that you brought about which is our education system if persons are educated young and old then we can have a we can have a cumulative discussion and then we can make the choice as a state to move in whichever direction that so fits the people of seducia thank you and sir your comments please or your question yeah my question is we're talking about culture and we can't have culture unless we deal with the foundation of culture which is abraculture so I want to know why as the lady was saying there's a decline in abraculture is our land not fertile why are we not promoting you know organic food to the world when we can see that's the trend you know why is this not addressed so can you tell the people why we're not interested in food and we're exporting so much food you know that's that's one of my questions thank you very good question I think from my perspective part of the reason I think this is happiness because of who our leaders are and what sectors they are coming from there isn't a culture of self-sufficiency in seducia there isn't a cut we we gone to the days when we at the fat poke and the ackee now we want the grapes that actually spoil two days after you get them or the apples we don't want the golden apples so again but as ember said look at where we get in the pool of the politicians that we elect are they coming from the abraculture basin no they coming from the private sector some are minibus operators and you know kudos to them they've done well some are from the hotel sector etc so and also as a people too as a people and it might be the psyche there isn't a we when you there is also almost a phobia about what's local meaning if it's local it's not good enough and we need to address that you know you boy that's local so it's again as a nation we need to be critical and we need to address it and it's a very very good point I don't have a solution but I know it starts with those that are trying to fashion the vision for us just an addition to cover but response I think we have to be mindful also that our society our economies were built on mercantile trade they are merchants who bring in things and sell it to make a profit that has become the core of our economic based in our society they have interests they have been facilitating the change of the taste buds of our people to the extent that people don't even know or like the taste of a local fruit because they're so used to the foreign fruit and we have been indoctrinated to believe that it's easier to get a consumer foreign fruit you would hear comments like a mango is too messy to take to school why should it bring a golden apple to school because you have to peel it whether you throw the seed you could just take an apple or grapes these types of subtle and not so subtle messages contributes to the decline of our appreciation for our local agriculture as well thank you yes sir your question or comment please yeah thanks good evening everybody I must say the discussion has been very spirited and and certainly very welcoming a lot of good ideas have actually been fouled it through this this panel discussion and some of the audience questions have also alluded to focusing on addressing those problems and I think one of the things that we need to look at is the whole idea of a broad development plan moving forward that can capture all those ideas that can capture all the specific issues political cultural social and bring together what apheloid gave us in his industrialization of the British West Indies which he published in 1950 was a plan and we may not have gone forward and implement that plan and there may even be a question as to whether the apheloid's model is still relevant today it may still be relevant today but then where is that new plan that looks at the 21st century and the new age the new challenges that also brings in some of the ideas of apheloids that brings in some of the the new ideas that that that that of course take on board some of the issues that we're now confronted with the whole issue of economic globalization the whole issue of trade liberalization how do we address that matter I mean I I heard a discussion about tourism the statistics about truly shown that what's happening with tourism in the Caribbean is a case of decline competitiveness we are not as competitive in selling tourism as perhaps the Dominican Republic and other and other regions how then do we address these issues where does the education sector fit into the broader plan so these are the issues I think a broad economic social whatever plan you may wish to call it can address thank you very much sir excellent contribution I want to just drop a dime here you realize that when we speak about tourism it's often time land-based tourism nobody speaks about the yachting industry when compared to cruise ship it's six times greater an economic contributor but every time people CTO doesn't even collect stats on yacht arrivals okay yachting you need very little very little infrastructure ask Soufre look at Soufre Soufre has been the mecca of yachting every yacht that leaves Martinique and Martinique has close over 60 000 yacht heads to Soufre to drop anchor en route to the Grenadines the Grenadines is probably one of the biggest water parks in the western hemisphere go down and visit it so your point is well taken not only do we have to revisit tourism and do tourism with very limited environmental and social impacts but also we need to stop focusing on this brick brick and mortar tourism that we need to build something huge I had a the talk about community-based tourism anybody anybody know whether a business plan was ever written for grozy late night it just evolved it evolved and look at that after all these years it's one of it's built as one of the what the best parties in the Caribbean there was no business model no business plan so at your point is well taken we need to regroup we need to discuss but also we need to have an open mind and that's why I keep talking about this slavery we need to be able to accept the old but be ready to take new initiatives within all these industries thank you very much yes ma'am okay I've been listening with a lot of interest but I think one of the things I want to start by saying is that our generation has failed the future generations I'm sorry but we have been existing in a kind of individualistic selfish kind of world I have heard let me give you a very small example I have heard people talk about the fact that there is only the jewel bras and panties for carnival well why not when we were going to mass camp did we take our children did we do anything in school about creating mass camps so that a trend could understand what it is to build a costume so why should they not want what they can just go and pick up at a building these are some of the things I'm going to but one of the the main issues here for me is that this kind of of industry and progress that you've been talking about has been going on without the development of our civil society without the development of our social programs with specific focus on the youth this panel discussion I would love to hear it with under 20 children I would love to hear what they are thinking about this particular discussion because to me we see us our time has passed let us talk yes but let us understand that whatever we have to do now is to prepare for the next generation and I'm not seeing enough of that right now the present generation has no voice and they are growing up not even being interested in anything they're not interested in anything's inclusion because what they get at their fingertips has nothing to do with the culture and traditions of this country everything I don't understand how somebody can be focusing on hotels and the tourism industry without the same focus on the development of our culture I just cannot understand that because to be one goes without the other sometimes I go to some of the hotels and I am totally shocked at what they are giving as inclusion I think the other point about about this lack of development of our civil society the entire Caribbean is suffering from a lack of leadership just look through the entire Caribbean and see what we have as leaders and what they are saying I think this whole consultation that we're speaking about it should be written as a legal part of the parliamentary process that it has to have consultation or it cannot go forward our youth are for the generations for tomorrow let us prepare them let us talk and let us try to rally and do stuff that will prepare them because too often we are talking among ourselves and adults and forgetting the youth thank you very much ma'am yes sir um good evening um as someone who has traveled extensively throughout the Caribbean I am a little bit perplexed by the concept of emancipation at Father Concert in San Lucia I would say I would even go further and say that to be a joke really a joke and I want to give some examples of what I'm saying for example throughout the region or in front of the world we celebrate Haiti as our first black republic within the region but yet a Haitian has to get a visa to come to San Lucia and to travel to many other Caribbean countries as well that shows me that we are not very serious about emancipation that's one of the reasons I'm saying so now I don't know if you're still a PS but Mr Prevail but I initiated a project that he supported about a year or two ago at the former cultural attaché to the consulate general office at Martinique and the project was based on the fact that there's no other region within the Caribbean other than Haiti who have utilized the African knowledge to develop themselves culturally and artistically and I was trying to use that artistic ability that they have so that we could set our tourism product to a different level when the tourists come to San Lucia what did they buy products that are imported from China from Taiwan from even other parts of the region and part of the project there's a project a simple project called Papua Marshape for example that they take juice papers and make birds out of it make animals out of it paint them up beautifully and they could form any kind of Caribbean animal or whatever iguanas or whatever out of that paper that is one of the projects we talked about carving look about using metal talk about using stones they take stones from a river and create art out of that and I'm talking about taking those knowledge that we could share with other within the region among ourselves so that we could teach solutions in different villages I was targeted for example uh Bruce Lee Anster Ray um some of the the the areas that we know that are touched economically right so that those individuals would learn how to create those objects that they could sell directly to the uh not directly to the tourists but directly to the the vendors that would in in in return sell to the tourists so they would have a ready market for the product so I mean this is the way we have to go if we're going to continue having our our tourists sorry the tourists come to the region and buy important stuff that are not indigenous to us it makes no sense so here we are creating jobs at the same time I want to touch a little further to on on on another aspect of the tourism um product we uh somebody spoke earlier about the comparison with the course of of um of vacationing here we've started to mingle on those countries and that's a reality yeah but again here we have an opportunity to marry what we call our our um indigenous um um um um hotel industry right and the future solar energy as far as I'm concerned every new hotel that is built in this country should be powered by solar energy why should we continue to be using fossil fuel when we have the natural energy of the sun you know that would lower the cost of of of a room because you no longer have to pay sluice like or whoever you know what I'm saying I mean come on we live in modern times today solar energy is not experimental it works thank you sir thank you thank you good evening um first of all I my name is Michael Angio I'll speak on two fronts one as a individual and also as a president of the I know the consulate of Rastafari I want to thank the panelists for a really positive um evening so far um also I want to um thank CDF for making this event a very possible one and a success of one um just a few things if I go into my illegal presentation I just want to tell the panelists that um though we have spoken about the need for Caribbean and national integration of our culture into our education system we must not live out Africa that is a link we cannot live out that's that's our motherland that's where it all started and we're talking emancipation so you cannot live out Africa um the other thing is that it surprises me that on the panel is there no one has mentioned the lack of a development plan for this country which is something we talk about lack of vision all these things but within a plan all that will be set the last brother spoke about um economic plan fair enough but all that is inclusive and a national development plan so hence the reason why when parties come every five years they shuffle and they shuffle and come with their own plans there is no buyable for the development of this country look at what is happening to our lands the cul-de-sac area primary culture land what is it now we're losing our values in our lands so when we talk about food security and food safety we're actually moving backward so unless we have a development plan that takes every component into existence into the idea the whole issue of constituencies all right and tongue-hold meetings I totally support you that should be an ongoing thing so when you come into into power sorry these constituency plans what you have to work from you're not coming and develop new plans that the people are not aware of they're not sensitized so our people have no ownership of nothing no ownership I was telling Boots a while ago although the constitutional reform maybe there's an extensive thing but rather than a constituency basis people understand what a constitution is and they would have greater input and they could claim ownership of it no one can claim ownership of it but those that actually were presenting it so I think we need to look at ownership from that perspective there's a few points based on what was said Primus mentioned the issue of vertical integration in terms of the whole pattern of development of the hotel and the tourism industry now if that is what is happening right now that means we have another form of colonization taking place in this country another form of slavery all right because you cannot tell me that the the companies now are actually trying to get agreements with the land owners that have these facilities so they control everything something has to be done the other thing I want to say is that this program today should be on a more national basis now I'm speaking as I'm president of ICA this program should be we should have a national committee for emancipation and when we sit and we plan emancipation activities that two to three weeks prior to the post of august and we have a legitimate basis for establishment for functioning that what comes out in this meeting or in this gathering goes to parliament that's the kind of approach we need to take that's all I'll say thank you thank you very much sir we have time for just one more person so you mentioned copper mentioned slavery and we had an interruption and we've also talked about the children they need to change the way they think but the fact is we don't know how we used to think before the interruption there's plenty of things that would benefit our people if we studied our culture before slavery it would help you would see how we looked on not religion but more god consciousness how we looked at community and how we respected the elders and how we're supposed to bring up the children as warriors and and innovators you know all of this was in our history before so we keep saying slaves slaves slaves and this what happened an interruption but they need to know how were we thinking before slavery and I think if we target that we will see some beautiful gems to help our people here in St. Lucia thank you very much sir we have time for just maybe one or two quick comments from the panelists just to summarize the the comments and the thoughts of everyone here it brings to question with regards to emancipation the two trails of thoughts that that led the path that lead the path to where we are now the first one being at emancipation most persons here are speaking of wanting to go back to our roots out whether it be african roots whether it be developing our own caribbean roots and the other path that we did go on unfortunately would have to be with wanting to run away from slavery on that emancipation day when persons are told that they are quote unquote free they want to there was a need to escape from anything that reminded you of enslavement whether it be the food whether it be the the the religious rituals that you were forced to take on etc and this is why europe is still the model for excellence what we see now is that there's a struggle where persons think that our culture as well as our african roots are pretty much a reminder of the past and something that we do not want which is why a lot of us have gone on the road even our governments have gone on to that road okay thank you for that and at this point we'll take our final break and when we come back we'll hear from our panelists the final words yeah man just planning to set up another hotel here look at this beautiful view boy i don't know you know this here is popular for large mangroves and you know that mangroves are important nurseries for marine life supporting the business of fishermen and seafood vendors in fact the mangrove also serves as a control and it stops many things that pollute the sea do you know that whatever you build here can destroy the marine life so so so my friend if you check the department of environment they will advise you on how your plan will help or how development in this area really i read something like that in the st george's declaration of principles for environmental sustainability in the OECS yes you know jobs and money and at all when you have a business i need to ensure that my business is environmentally friendly for this community can we talk over lunch regular place sure you paying of course contact your local department of environment and how you can make your community provide a better quality of life for all back to the emancipation panel discussion brought to you by the cultural development foundation our theme has been emancipation through your eyes tourism politics and economic freedom and at this time as we close off each of our panelists are going to give their final words and we shall start with mr. Charles sir just let our panelists make the comments and then we'll come to you yes i want to just my final comments would be that um we have to realize that the people who create problems for us will not want to solve the problems because it's their benefit so we have to look towards a different sector in our society for solutions to the situation we're facing now and to support some of the the comments from the floor we have to look at civil society i think that is where some of the energy the new ideas will come from and i think all of us should be committed to one in one way or another supporting a civil society group consumer association your own ianola improvement association or whatever and to me that is the way we should go thank you mr breville yeah i think this was a very good initiative by cdf the question now is is there a civil society ready to engage discussion of anything any subject we don't talk in this country we do not have any place where we speak in this country i don't know any politician holding any body for gun to the head saying do not speak i don't understand why people talk about politicians if you express a view they think left or right since when politicians were your masters i know they're not my master so if you feel they are your master you have a problem this is a free country and we have freedom to think and express our thoughts once we are genuine in what we're saying if you have a genuine intention express your thought i want to thank you very much and i believe this is a very good forum and i hope we have it more often thank you very much sir miss lago yes i would just like to echo mr breville's words i do hope that we continue to have this conversation this was an excellent discussion put together by cdf and i'm grateful for that we've heard from ourselves as well as the audience that there needs to be more dialogue and this is only the beginning a lot of ideas have come out of wanting the youth as well as the rest of civil society to engage in conversation and i i think why not and this should be a call for us to do this more often and at least for one person in here to take the initiative to start that conversation thank you miss mr didier i prefer just didier um i have to say well thanks to cdf and also very esteemed bright people on this panel i really enjoyed it and from the floor i want to thank the brother from ike i thought it was a very good summary of a way forward that look at emancipation day celebrations in a in a build-up and form a committee and it maybe can start from cdf i would definitely volunteer my time because i think it is worth it but in summing up i do want to say that let us take this this concept of freedom serious for a long time we dig rastafari movement and we hear about africa and all the heroes i want to say i learn about black history through listening to reggae music that's the first time i heard about steve biko and all these other people the brother said something which is very very positive and the other contributor we need to go back to the roots and we need to make sure that is in the school curriculum you know and not only start from the people who came but go back a one book that has really changed my vision of the caribbean was by walter rodney how europe underdeveloped africa maybe we should start from there by making it mandatory from all the secondary schools but i have to say kudos to cdf and a wonderful audience and we've come to the end of our emancipation panel discussion and we would like to take this time to say thank you to flow the cultural development foundation baywalk shopping mall and ntn and of course our wonderful panelist and our audience we will see you next year or maybe as has come out from this a discussion may be maybe next month next week