 The St. Lucia Chess Federation and the Ministry of Youth Development and Sports will be collaborating to promote chess in St Lucia. The ministry has agreed to provide support to the Federation, which will insist in advancing the sport locally. One of the main issues is the promotion of the sport. It is not widely known and so the appeal is to get more persons involved in the schools at the community level and we have made a commitment to provide a level of support to them and to ensure that the sport is developed, that there are clubs and more persons are playing. Trishan Roberts, president of the Chess Federation, welcomed the discussions with the Minister of Sports and his team. Also looking forward to the future, she hopes to improve the lives of the youth through the sport of chess. I think there is no better time to really come together and have a discussion of how we could better develop our youths throughout St Lucia and get every kid playing chess because it is not just good for a fun board game, but it is good for your brain, it helps you to be a better critical thinker, it helps you to be better at maths, English, there are so many benefits for chess and the more persons that are aware of that, especially in government and in leadership and authoritative positions, that is really able to do something I think, you know, you could not have it any better way. St Lucia will participate in the 44th Chess Olympiad hosted in India, July 28th to August 10th. Marvin St. Louis reporting from the Ministry of Youth Development and Sports.