 St. Lucia is staying focused on using Sargassum seaweed for commercial purposes, particularly in communities that have had massive build-ups and negatively impacted by the decaying seaweed. Since 2011, the picturesque coastlines of several Caribbean states have been marred by periodic massive influxes of Sargassum seaweed resulting in substantial economic losses and adverse impacts on human and environmental health. The Caribbean Regional Fisheries Mechanism and the New Zealand Institute of Plant and Food Research are embarking on a project to confirm what products would be more suitable to make from the Sargassum. Particularly when we look at the Sargassum outlook for this year in particular is going to be a bumper year. We are going to have satellite imagery has shown that there is going to be quite a bit of Sargassum landed at our various bays so we need to work towards how can we utilize that Sargassum for commercial purposes. The other aspect of it is we have a project coming on stream from the UNDP, United Nations Development Programme, which will be providing St. Lucia with equipment and machinery to help support the removal and the intention is that how can we integrate these two projects, how can we help remove for the purpose of using it for commercial uses for economic benefit. It is expected that St Lucia will be provided with equipment and machinery to help support the removal of Sargassum and channel it for commercial purposes. As it stands now, the Sargassum situation is horrid. We know that a lot of the community members are impacted very negatively. I mean we pass along the East Coast and we know what it's the stentions like and we pass but imagine those who are actually living in the community and how they've been impacted and there's nothing more that we can say except that we do understand how negatively it's impacting their livelihoods, their lives, their well-being etc. The challenges is that by the time you remove some of the Sargassum because it's again a bumper year is as quickly as it will return. Presently there is a proposal to use the Sargassum as fertilizer or building material. This project is expected to take some time in terms of planning and grant funding but is expected to result in long-term solutions to the problem of decaying Sargassum. From the Ministry of Agriculture, Fisheries, Food Security and Rural Development, I'm Ryan O'Brien.