 Welcome to NTN Nightly, I am Genelle Norville, this edition's top stories. The NIC pays out more than $19 million and processes over 26,000 applications under the Economic Relief Program. International travel resumes to the island under revised protocols and draft protocols for beach vendors under review as the tourism industry reopens. The National Insurance Corporation NIC has made major headway in the delivery of the Economic Relief Program, ERP, over the last few weeks. Under the program, the NIC provides financial support to contributors to help them navigate the financial challenges presented by the COVID-19 pandemic. As of the 8th of July 2020, 26,161 applications have been processed and a total of $19.5 million has been paid to qualifying applicants covering the months of April and May. NIC's communications manager MacNorton McLean says that while payments have been made to all applicants for April and May, with completed information, a number of applications remain on query, which the NIC is actively engaged in resolving. The backlog of queried claims has been reduced to 810, which is 3.09% of total applications processed to date. This represents a significant reduction in the initial batch of 4,777 that formed 47.76% of the flood of applications for income support at the start of the Economic Relief Program in April. How fast an applicant gets paid under the ERP for a particular month depends on the following critical elements. Accuracy of the information provided by the employee on the ERPE form, the timing of filing the application, example filing for April and June, and the employer uploading relevant employee information via the employer portal on a timely basis. Although we have made over 20,000 payments, some applicants would experience considerable delays as a result of incomplete or inaccurate information relating to their applications. The NIC took the decision to process applications for the months of April and May 2020 and make payments to these applicants in the absence of upload by some employers in order to expedite payments to these applicants because some of these applications had remained unpaid for too long. The information was too slow in coming from some employers. The NIC empathized with the applicant and understood the challenges confronting them and the NIC could reasonably assume that persons were not in employment for that period. While the NIC has used its discretion for the period mentioned, McLean explained what will obtain going forward. The NIC is aware that most employees outside the tourism sector have returned to work during the month of June and it would be contrary to the spirit and intent of the program to pay economic relief support to persons in receipt of a salary. The NIC is also aware that some employers are either reluctant or unwilling to send in or upload the information necessary for the NIC to ascertain the employment status of the applicant. Reluctantly, because of this, the NIC will only be processing payments for the month of June for applicants whose employers have provided the information required by the NIC. In such cases, applicants should expect at a minimum to wait a long time before receiving any payment from the NIC. That's for the period of June. The NIC has commenced making payments for June, claimants who previously applied for the ERP are not required to reapply. However, employers are required to provide updated information in the employer portal on the NIC website on the status of the employees as this is critical to ensuring that employees are paid in a timely manner. Meanwhile, on Sunday, July 12, the Economic Recovery and Resilience Plan for St. Lucia will be unveiled. Prime Minister and Minister for Finance, Economic Growth, Job Creation, External Affairs and the Public Service Hon. Alan Shastney has explained that the plan is part of the government's structured and long-term response to the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic. The plan was prepared by the Ministry of Finance with recommendations from the Economic Recovery Multisectorial Committee comprising representatives from the private sector, trade unions and employers. That body was tasked with making recommendations to repair an Economic Recovery and Resilience Plan, given the adverse effects that the lockdown and physical distancing measures have had on the earnings of all sectors within the economy. Because of COVID-19, I don't know when I'll be able to work again. Because of the coronavirus, we've lost 80% of our revenue. How can the government ban start the economy? The coronavirus took us unexpected, so we can blame the government, but we're just uncertain of the future. As a bus driver, how do that stimulus package help you? This is the coronavirus thing that's not been the same. I just want to know what the government do to help single mothers take care of their children. Considering the stimulus package, I would like to know how it will be implemented. Tune in on Sunday as we present the Solution Economic and Recovery Resilience Plan. There's something there for everyone. Together we will continue to build a new and stronger solution. The COVID-19 Economic Recovery and Resilience Plan seeks primarily to curtail the impact that both global and domestic economic contraction is having on the business sector, drive economic activity through public sector capital investment projects, protect the poor, marginalized and most vulnerable segments of the St Lucia population, accelerate reforms that will build the resilience of the private and public sector, and strengthen the health system. The plan will be detailed Sunday, July 12 at 8pm on the National Television Network, NTN and local partner stations. St Lucia welcomed international travel activity Thursday 9th July as revised travel protocols came into effect. Pre-testing prior to travel is mandatory. Visitors must provide a negative PCR test result, taken 7 days or less before travel to St Lucia. All arriving passengers are screened, including temperature checks at the Hironore International Airport. Donna Lynn Vite is the permanent secretary in the Ministry of Tourism. She spoke to the protocols in an update to the nation. We know there may be sleep-ups in that system. We are preparing for the sleep-ups, and so this is why the PM or the Prime Minister would have alluded to the testing on arrival. This is not the travel protocol that we have established significantly, but it is there to be able to mitigate any shortfalls within the system. And I thank the Prime Minister for indicating that to the public. So is it there to accommodate perhaps someone who may have arrived with a negative test, but by the time they get to St Lucia, would have perhaps been exhibiting symptoms? That is one of the reasons. Significantly, it is there to ensure that any gaps are closed and are closed at the airport so that persons who enter St Lucia do not have that opportunity to go and mingle or co-mingle with persons to increase the risk. Any symptomatic passengers will be isolated and tested. They will be required to remain in quarantine, isolation at the hotel, or government operated quarantine facility until the test result is obtained. If the test is positive, they will be transferred to a treatment facility until they receive two negative test results and are clinically stable. Effective Friday, July 10, 2020, there will be a further relaxing of measures instituted to protect the nation from COVID-19. Cinemas will reopen, early childhood development centres are also to open, tournaments, sporting events and contact sports with protocols for spectators are being allowed. The yachting sector will reopen with strict protocols. Chief Medical Officer Dr Sharon Belmar George says it is important that the protocols at cinemas be observed. Children who have respiratory signs and symptoms would not be allowed in. In those cases, parents would have to keep those children at home and disinfection and cleaning of those areas would have to be a lot more frequent than before. And also the habit of putting more than one child within close proximity would no longer be allowed. So it's a lot of new measures. Unfortunately, we have to adopt to reduce any possibility of contamination because we know with children, they go on to each other. It's more difficult to be able to implement those measures. So it means, first of all, they would not be able to take in the volume of kids that they normally have at any one point. This is another thing, the number of kids that you take into one space would be reduced and the measures that you put in place at the facility would have to change. Are you requiring the children themselves to be wearing masks? No, we're not allowing the children to wear masks because what the recommendation for masks, if you sufficiently distance the necessary measures, you don't have to keep the mask on all of the time. Protocols for the early childhood centres or daycare centres were developed in conjunction with the St. Lucia Bureau of Standards and Ministry of Education. We look at infection prevention and control which the staff of the cinema has to make sure are in place for everyone coming in. And also it won't be what we normally see in the cinema where everybody just sits together. Similar to the seating within the religious organisations, families can sit together in the same pool in the same bench but you can't have everybody sitting in close. So it would have to be either alternate or every two other seats to ensure spacing. And also the crowding and grouping where you get your drinks and your eats, physical distancing would have to be implemented at that level. The curfew instituted at the height of the pandemic in St. Lucia has also been lifted. The National Conservation Authority NCA has appealed to seaside vendors to await clearance before resuming their trade as St. Lucia's hotels and tourism sector reopens in a pilot phase. 17 properties including hotels, sites and attractions have attained COVID-19 compliance. In addition, 56 dayboat operators have been cleared by the St. Lucia Air and Seaport Authority, Slasper, to operate in a pilot phase. Understanding the beach vendors are anxious to return to apply in their trade, NCA Commercial Services Officer Lydia Cox stressed that this must be done in adherence to protocols specific to their enterprise. However, they cannot return to the beach until we say so because there are a number of things that need to be put in place, the protocols for the activities on the beach. Also, we have to look at the training of these vendors because everything is going to be different now. It's not going to be business as usual. And for this reason, we've asked our vendors to stay away from the beach until we've put everything in place to ensure that they are safe and that the persons that they are dealing with, the people that they will be dealing with are also safe. Draft protocols for beach vendors are currently being reviewed for approval. Meantime, the NCA Office has assisted some vendors with applications for income support offered by the Government of St. Lucia to non-contributors of the NIC, whose livelihoods suffered due to the effects of the pandemic. We have been assisting them from the office by applying on their behalf. However, I would like to say to the vendors that you need to pay your NIC. Moving forward, you need to pay your NIC because it is your money you're putting away for later. And none of us saw what was going to happen today with COVID. But besides, when you get older, when you retire, when you can no longer work, this is what you're going to be depending on to give you a little something on a monthly basis so you can survive. So we'd like to encourage them to now look at this whole thing and revisit how they do their business and to pay their NIC contribution. That was Lydia Cox Commercial Services Officer at the National Conservation Authority. The NCA is also appealing to beach-goers to clean up after themselves, noting a stark contrast of the pristine condition of the shores during the COVID-19 restrictions and the resumption of indiscriminate waste disposal as the beaches reopened. And this is NTIA Nightly, up next, Primers-Hudginson with the NTIA Nuffel Aquial. It is possible for infected food handlers or workers to introduce the COVID-19 virus into food or onto surfaces within the food business by coughing and sneezing or through hand contact unless they strictly follow good personal hygiene practices. Food handlers must wash their hands before starting work, before handling cooked or ready to eat food, after handling or preparing raw food, after handling waste, after cleaning duties, after using the toilet, after blowing the nose or sneezing or coughing, after eating or drinking, and after handling money. More than ever before, your important role as gatekeepers of St. Lucia's nutritional health and food security should be taken seriously. When you exercise these precautions, you not only safeguard your health, but also continue to allow St. Lucia's access to clean, healthy and safe food. Remember, it is our responsibility to ensure our nation is fresh, St. Lucia's best. Welcome back. We join Primers-Hudginson for the NTIA Nuffel Aquial. Thank you very much, General. Thank you, Madam University Department for the information on the Government of St. Lucia, GIS and the National Television of the NTIA Nuffel Aquial. Thank you, Primers-Hudginson. I am very happy to be here in the name of Allen Chastney, to address the Nation and to address the Nation. On Wednesday 12 July we will present the Government in its way to raise the economy of the Nation with full resilience. It will be done in 8 years. The National Television of the NTIA. I am very happy to be here and hear your responsibility to finance and create an economy for the easing of employment among all public positions. I want to explain to you that the Salah Initiative is a government plan in order to address the situation of COVID-19 for those who are coming. The Ministry of Finance has been preparing the Salah for the recommendation of the committee which is responsible for the recommendation of the Committee of the Salah Committee in the representative of the private sector, the CDC, and the union with the employees. I want to present the recommendation in a way to prepare for the resuscitation of the economic pay-as, under consideration of the Salah, which is in place for COVID-19 patients mainly as a social distance situation which has affected the whole sector of the economic sector. I want to present the recommendation with a pay for service, utility, and not even capable of pursuing a career. Currently, I am learning how to implement diverse ways to immediately address these situations. Among these, it is a national program to help people who have peace and who do not work presently. The plan of this economic situation is possibly to seek in these diverse ways to cover the economic situation and also domestic matter in this sector of business. It is to protect the people and others who are most vulnerable to the country's population. Plus, it is also to seek in the face to build resilience in this sector of business, to strengthen this system, and to continue to build resilience in this sector in general. So, the journey is an invitation for all of us here to look forward to addressing this issue. We have lemon and assobitch. You just cut and cut the zodiacs. Two birds with one stone. We cut the lemon, and cut the zodiacs. We cut the lemon, and cut the zodiacs. We need to have that right now. Right, we need to have that right now. We have to have that right now. Right, exactly. We need to have that right now. We need to have that right now. Officers who are working at the NCEA, ladies and gentlemen, we have a company that is working on the normal life. We have a small company that is working on the normal life. We have a company that is working on the normal life. They are here specifically to support the rest of the male mentre. Before we started, we had decided to work on the laying of the man outlets to help the families to support seminar. But during the seminar, it was fighting again, that is the reason we are here. Because we have� We have to pay the people who are working here. So, currently, we don't have any people. If we don't have any people, we don't have any business. We don't have any place to sell. A lot of the people here are working in the Bicila, we have to go to the activity, we have to go to the wet fed, Actually, we don't do that. Actually, we do a little bit of work. We don't do parties. We do a lot of work. We do a lot of work. We do a little bit of work, but we don't do a lot of work. All these things are different. I had a plane that started to take flight to PAYA. This week. Cinema with different activities. I found permission to operate. Also educational institutions. The Minister of Agriculture and Fisheries said there is no more trust in this program that the government has implemented to assist farmers with the cultivation of PAYA. We have called Joseph Niespaki to assist the farmers to grow the economy for the economy of agriculture, and the economy of the corona. According to the Minister of Agriculture, the government can assist farmers with the official extension of agriculture and the government. We have to assist the farmers to grow the economy to help the farmers to eat PAYA. So, I think that based on the intervention of the government, we have a private entity, but with the government, where it is necessary to buy food, to buy food, on behalf of the Ministry, of course, on behalf of the farmers, we thank the Prime Minister, we also thank the Cabinet for the support of the Ministry of Agriculture and Fisheries for the programs that are implemented to make sure that farmers are comfortable. Minister, I would like to thank Joseph Tika Pali, who has provided us with a $1.4 million for PAYA Debt Wintresh for NFTO. Thank you very much for your time, Madam. I would also like to thank Mr Ota for his invitation to join me in the meeting. Thank you very much for your time, Mr Ota. Thank you very much, Chanel.