 Baroness Scotland is the second Secretary-General from the Caribbean and the first woman to hold the post. A lawyer by profession, she hails from the island of Dominica and has been Secretary-General since 2015. Baroness Scotland paid a courtesy call on Minister for Education, Sustainable Development, Innovation, Science, Technology and Vocational Training, Honourable Sean Edward last week and articulated the support of the Commonwealth of Nations to the island in several areas. Chief among them, climate change. Her visit to St. Lucia comes on the heels of a hurricane season, expected to be a busy period by most estimations. The Commonwealth Secretary-General says the organization is committed to helping address the issues of vulnerability of small island developing states like St. Lucia. It was the Commonwealth in Malaysia in Langkawi who identified the existential threat that climate posed. And of course here in the Caribbean we know what that feels like. There are people whose lives have been destroyed or touched by climate change. And so it was a great privilege and pleasure for us to talk about what we're doing, how we can address the issues of vulnerability, address the issues of debt, the importance of our Universal Vulnerability Index which takes into account not just the GDP of a country but the reality of what this vulnerability means. St. Lucia has been able to benefit from the Commonwealth's Climate Finance Access Hub which has delivered some 50 million US dollars to help improve climate change resilience. Baroness Scotland says the Commonwealth wants to build on the successes of the last few years in digitization and youth entrepreneurship, especially with the lessons learned from the COVID-19 pandemic and the innovation which resulted from its challenges. It is an area dear to the St. Lucia government with plans to create a youth economy to help build entrepreneurship among St. Lucia's younger population. She's an individual I've followed very, very closely, professionally. And one thing I've been able to discern from all of what I've seen of her is that she is very compassionate. She is very professional and she is a champion of small island states like St. Lucia. So today it was not at all difficult to make conversation on some of the issues that plague St. Lucia and other small island states. We spoke about the whole climate change situation as it confronts small island states of seeds as we call them. We spoke about the long lasting relationship that St. Lucia has been able to forge with the Commonwealth along the lines of education. Minister Edward was joined by his cabinet colleague, youth and sports minister Hon. Kenson Kasemi, who articulated the areas of youth development and sports which he hopes can receive the support of the Commonwealth. The young people are really the future. And when you talk about training, when he speaks of Commonwealth coming in and providing training as a youth minister, that actually is something that I'm very passionate about as well. The skills training overseas to ensure that they're better alive, I think is something that is very, very important. And so I think we are on the right track. I think we can continue to show our appreciation to Commonwealth as it pertains to our youth policy. We are very, very close to having an actual youth policy passed in St. Lucia thanks to the work that was commenced years ago. The Commonwealth of Nations is made up of 54 sovereign states, formerly British dependencies, which have preferred to maintain ties with the United Kingdom and acknowledge its British monarch as symbolic head of the association. St. Lucia is among 32 island states of the Commonwealth considered to be vulnerable to climate and development challenges mainly because of their shared size and economy. From the communications unit of the Ministry of Education, Sustainable Development, Innovation, Science, Technology and Vocational Training, I am Chris Satney reporting.