 Welcome to NTN Nightly. I am General Norvell. This edition stops stories. St Lucia's tourism sector is poised for a major rebound. Helen's daughter signs MOU with export St Lucia. And the Ministry of Health and Wellness is urging St Lucia to quit tobacco use. St Lucia's tourism sector is poised for a major rebound. Some 14,339 visitors to the island were recorded in May, with two thirds of industry employees back at work and hundreds of accommodation properties reopening. All these tourism officials explained are positive indicators for St Lucia's tourism sector. We get details in this report. St Lucia's tourism sector is poised for a major rebound with 81% of the US market already recovered. The ministries of tourism and health and wellness are working feverishly to ensure the safe reopening of the tourism sector. Minister for Tourism, Information and Broadcasting, Culture and Creative Industries Hon. Dominic Fede during a recent press conference stated that the sector is off to a great start with a prediction of a very strong rebound in the month of June. This, the tourism minister explained is signaled by a number of factors including local accommodation properties reporting high levels of occupancy, almost 10,000 industry employees returning to work, the reopening of over 200 villas having received the COVID-19 license to operate and some 120 more accommodation properties are being allowed to operate with only vaccinated guests. Hon. Fede also disclosed that talks with cruise officials have been positive and continue. We also are anticipating the return of the first cruise line to St Lucia. Those discussions are still ongoing now. We want to make sure that we do everything to ensure that this is done in a safe way and we're going to do this step-by-step to make sure that the amount of cruise passengers that are allowed on island are manageable. This is a very collective position that we have with the cruise lines who themselves are looking at making sure that we have numbers that are manageable. So we're very, very close to announcing with more specificity the date by which we will have the first cruise call into St Lucia. This will mean a significant amount of good news for vendors and taxi drivers and duty-free employees and companies and more numbers for sites and attractions and the whole list of spin-offs in the tourism and silvery sector is going to benefit significantly from this. No effort to fully reopen the sector is being spared as the Ministry of Tourism is working with some 200 accommodation properties to become COVID-19 certified. Approximately 1,500 taxi drivers have been certified with the intention of getting an additional 4,000 tourism transportation providers certified including H-split holders so as to get them back into operation. Car rental businesses are allowed to operate providing services to only fully vaccinated individuals. Minister Hon. Fady also assured that the ministries are working assiduously to ensure the safe return of the cruise industry and the resulting livelihoods however the health and safety of all St Lucia's remain top priority. What we want to make sure is that this is done safely and that while we want to ensure that a lot of our vendors are participating in the economic benefits from the return of the cruise industry we certainly don't want to expose anyone to danger and we have to ensure that we are ready to do this. There's a lot to consider vaccinated versus non-vaccinated passengers. The fact that not a significant amount of people below the ages of 18 are vaccinated for example how do you treat those there are a lot of questions that we need to answer very specifically to make sure that we can feel comfortable to do this but I'm very confident I continue saying to you that we are going to reach an agreement with the cruise lines very soon on a set of protocols that are mutually beneficial. St Lucia Tourism Authority's public relations manager Jareen Georges sharing in the minister's optimism about St Lucia's tourism projections provided arrival figures. For the month of May we have definitely seen some upticks our weekends are especially busy as it relates to the Uriner International Airport we know the changes that have been made to the various protocols including that for vaccinated travelers and definitely we're seeing about 50% of our arrivals being vaccinated and so for the month of May the destination welcomed a total of 14,339 visitors and of course that did surpass our projections by 35% and we're looking forward to of course like ministers that are very busy summer period for the industry. The press conference was held on Wednesday 16th June 2021 from the Government Information Service, I am General Norvel. St Lucia Distillers displays confidence in St Lucia's economy with a $30 million expansion of its facilities in the Roseau Valley. The premier rum producer in the eastern Caribbean over the past 18 months has built three new sellers with a capacity of storing 12,000 oak barrels. We get details in this report. Prime Minister Hon. Alan Chastney headed the list of dignitaries which included Bernard Hyatt, the president of Group Bernard Hyatt GBH the parent company of St Lucia Distillers. The occasion was the official opening of three new sellers built over the past two years with strict adherence to COVID-19 protocols. Prime Minister Chastney noted the commitment of GBH in spite of the global pandemic. And I want to thank you personally that despite what was going on with COVID I am one person who does not take your commitment and your continuation for granted. I want to thank you very very much. Bernard Hyatt, the president of GBH was present for the official commissioning of the new sellers but it was his son Rudolph who provided the details of the project. Each of the sellers will contain nearly 3,700 oak barrels. They will bring the total capacity of St Lucia Distillers to more than 12,000 barrels. The construction of the new sellers is one of three projects airmarked by GBH since it acquired the distillery in 2016. The first ensured that award winning rums produced by St Lucia Distillers got profiled and marketed globally. Another project is the development of a rum and heritage attraction in the Roseau Valley. This was welcomed by a member of parliament for the area Honourable Dominic Fede who is also the minister for tourism. While we can boast of some of the finest beaches in the world I think what makes us really sexy is to say to the world that we also have some of the finest blends and that in itself is a big draw and makes us extremely attractive and so congratulations to you and the entire rum industry for your continued evolution over the years. The Prime Minister also applauded the employer-employee relationship noting the role of the National Workers Union. I'm very happy to see the relationship that you've developed with the workers. This is a very important aspect to what we do in our country. It cannot be that we believe that we can succeed without bringing along the workers of this country and so one, the investment you're making, the training you're making and certainly the upgrading of the equipment I know will augur very well for the persons who work here. The next major development at St Lucia Distillers will be the rum and heritage tour which will be situated on a 25 acre site. It will incorporate the distillery and the sugar plantation. For the Government Information Service, I am Jesse Leans reporting. Helen's daughters and entity committed to lending support to rural women in agriculture on Wednesday signed a memorandum of understanding with Export St Lucia. Hermadi Mark has details on the initiative. Helen's daughters, an organisation dedicated to providing support to rural women in agriculture has signed a memorandum of understanding with Export St Lucia. The organisation aids its members with the use of adaptive agricultural techniques, capacity building and improved market access. Through the signing of this agreement, Helen's daughters hopes to continue to empower women and enable them to play a more prominent role in the value chain of the agricultural sector. CEO of Helen's daughters, Kiflin Karoo, believes this is the start of a new era for rural women in agriculture. As a society, we often do not realise the integral role that women play from throughout the value chain, from reproduction to marketing to processing. And as a result of our stereotypes, women have been cut out of a lot of opportunities in the agricultural sector, particularly in training, receiving finance and capacity development. And agriculture from yesterday to even today still remains an important productive sector of ours. I mean, it employs about 21% of persons in the labour force. But when we break it down, 9% of that is women, whereas 12% of that is men. And when we speak of actually skilled labour, it's 2% of women being skilled workers, whereas there's only about 8% of men being skilled, which really drives down on this demonstration that at the end of the day, there's a lot of need for investment and support in upskilling the labour force overall, particularly in the agricultural sector, but definitely in also focusing on the most marginalised communities, such as women and youth. The signing of the Memorandum of Understanding between the two entities on June 16th, 2021 enables Export St Lucia to provide technical support to Helen's daughters and its members. CEO of Export St Lucia, Sunita Daniels says they are committed to strengthening Helen's daughters in any capacity possible. One of the things we want to do with them is to really assist them with research to help them with market access. There are a lot of things that they're doing that Export St Lucia can really bring some expertise to and we're really, really looking forward to working with Helen's daughters. I'm sure it will be a very fulfilling partnership and it's something we're so excited and we're really looking forward to seeing where it all leads. We really want to see more girls getting involved in agricultural activity, more teenage girls, more teenage women getting involved in agricultural activities. We want women to see agriculture as a very viable career that they can go into and so with Helen's daughters we're hoping to do that. Some projects to be derived from the new partnership include the creation of a seed bank to aid farmers in the diversification of produce and the development of a virtual course for persons looking to tap into export markets. From the Government Information Service, I'm Hermione Mark reporting. The mentorship component of the Our Boys Matter program has advanced. June 2021 saw the pairing of beneficiaries with their mentors. In a brief ceremony for the pairing, the St Lucia Social Development Fund, SSDF, facilitating agency for the program says they will initially challenge with finding male figures to mentor the secondary school boys. Thankfully, members of a Christian sec, the brotherhood of St Andrew, availed themselves. This helped the SSDF meet its mentor quota for the program. There is no shortage of women ladies to mentor, you know. There is no shortage of that. But there's a shortage of males and we have, my personal belief is that because a lot of these boys have not been exposed to positive role models that I think it is critical and I've battled a little bit with Miss Edwin and Miss Anthony and you know, in terms of whether we should bring on board female mentors and finally I said, look, if we cannot get males, let's do females because some sort of mentorship is better than none. So I was very happy when the brotherhood stepped forward and you know and willing to assist us with that but make no mistake about it. These boys and young ladies by the matter, by for that matter need the presence of positive male male models in their life, role models and it's for that reason that we're very happy that you are here. Chief Education Officer Dr. Fiona Philip Meyer charged the young men to make the most of the mentorship program. They have decided it is important enough to spend their time with you so here's what I need you to do boys I need you to make some very clear choices as to how you're going to be respectful of their time you're going to show gratitude for their time you're going to engage in activities that is for your benefit, not necessarily for them because the benefactor the beneficiaries are you the responsibility that they've decided they want to shoulder is that of the society, that of your parents more so your fathers and if somebody decides it's important enough for me to spend time with you, respect that individual. The mentorship drive eventually attracted 45 mentors exceeding the 23 needed for the ceremony's pairing session The Our Boys Matter program is an ongoing initiative of the SSDF that offers resource support and mentorship for at-risk males at the secondary school level St. Lucian's are again being urged to quit tobacco use as it presents a severe threat to their health more in this report from Jack Hinkson Compton St. Lucia recently joined the rest of the world in observing World No Tobacco Day The event which was organized by the World Health Organization seeks to discourage persons from tobacco use This year's observances are being held under the theme commit to quit In a panel discussion held to mark the occasion senior medical officer for non-communicable diseases Dr. Shana Sierra-Filbert reminded the public of some of the dangers of tobacco use Smoking affects every organ in the body especially your respiratory system so of course you're inhaling smoke your body was not made to inhale smoke and so the whole immune system of your respiratory system is affected so smokers tend to be more prone to getting respiratory diseases like tuberculosis they get flus etc diseases like that more often than someone who does not smoke In 2019 and 2020 St. Lucia enacted a new legislation designed to reduce the number of public locations in which people can smoke Deputy Director of the Substance Abuse Advisory Council Secretariat Johanna Joseph Henry explained the intended benefits of the laws The big big concern right now is to try as much as possible to reduce the exposure the initiation of our young persons into tobacco use The Public Health Act was revised to allow the control of smoking in public places in workplaces and close places and close public places as well as outdoor public places So the purpose of all of that is to reduce the exposure of individuals to tobacco smoke The 2021 World No Tobacco Day Observances also included the unveiling of a new mascot named Lucia Lung which was designed by a student of the St. Mary's College For the Ministry of Health and Wellness I am Jacques Hingson Compton Caricum Secretary General calls for resilient energy systems that cause citizens to lose their jobs Caricum News Times to San King English Francis has more Caricum Secretary General Ambassador Irwin LaRocke issued a call for partnerships to finance Caricum's 20 billion US dollars energy transition targets Speaking at a high level meeting on energy financing on May 27 he said small island developing states can respond better to the COVID-19 pandemic and the climate change with the help of accelerated clean energy transition For this to happen he said the region has to leverage the collective strengths of partners In essence a new type of Marshall plan for the energy sector is needed The Caricum proposal around which today's dialogue is focused is only a part of what is required and outlines an investment pipeline of about 5 billion US in the proposal Member States present projects that can support their ambitions to exploit cost-effective indigenous renewable energy sources to improve their power grids to increase the application of distributed energy resources including energy efficiency measures and to integrate electric vehicles into the transport system The discussion attracted the participation of Caricum ministers of energy heads of financial institutions and partners and the private sector This is NTN Nightly Up next, Primus Hutchinson will be NTN Nobel of way on Welcome back We join Primus Hutchinson for the NTN Nobel of way on Mr. Yotam Genel Mr. Madame Department of University of Performing Government of this This is GIS I'm sorry, I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry This is GIS National Television NTN New York Primus Hutchinson First of all, we have Alain Chastney who is a project of St. Louis Distillus which is a valuable resilience project by private sector and the government to continue to trust a project worth millions of dollars This is a good position to support the economy under the corona virus We have an address to ask for your help Prime Minister Chastney pay attention to the corona virus and the situation of the corona virus facing us If the citizens continue to live in this country Prime Minister Chastney will appreciate the new salary worth millions of dollars Prime Minister will thank his great companies St. Louis Distillus for his commitment to protect the business of the corona virus by doing a lot of business to keep the business safe Prime Minister Chastney will benefit the economy in three ways First of all, we have to work together especially as a company We have to work together to build the tourism project Prime Minister Chastney will also support the business of the corona virus so that we can continue to do for the country we must all work together for the salary We have to do the registration of the office of the electricity We have to do the registration of the office of the electricity in three ways Prime Minister Chastney will do the registration of the office of the electricity according to the director of the electricity so that we can assist that office. We have to know that when we got the money the system worked in the system After it worked and collect the kinds of information you need we have to provide all that we need that books because last year we had to thank information. information. information. information. interview. with Yuccaidou, who I could have come to this place. Why Yuccaidou came to this place? Well, yes. Because he could have come to this place with love. It could be sacred. But if the people who I could have come to this place would not have come to this place, the year of the offering, where it was just a piece of paper, with a person who came to this place. The Le Fauré Department recently held a ceremony to present the prize for Yon who found victory in the participation of the competition in the observance of the water affairs. The competition was an observance of the water affairs at the earth and at the Le Fauré. All this was to make the public happy. And therefore, Le Fauré needed to protect the natural resources of the country. To be able to qualify for the competition we had a problem. We had to protect the natural resources of the country, so that the natural resources of the country could be explained in a positive way. The Le Fauré Department's chief officer, Alwen Donnelly, offered these big roles for the competition to make the public happy and to help the people continue to protect the natural resources of the earth. He complemented these participants to engage in this program to help them protect the natural resources of the country. The director of Agers for the management of the water resources of the country, Jason Ernest, encouraged these participants to continue to make the public more sensitive to the potential to protect the natural resources of the country. In the case of the Le Fauré Department, Alwen Donnelly , selected the leader of the Thank you so much for watching. I hope to see you in the next video. I hope to see you in the next video. Thank you. See you in the next video.