 Welcome to the NTN Nightly, I'm Nisha Traus, this edition's job stories. Saint Lucia scores another winning occasion as a romance destination with an underwater wedding. The Department of the Public Service continues to build capacity among senior personnel. Helen's daughters advance on economic empowerment for rural women, all that plus the latest in youth development, sports and the NTN Nouvelle Arcueon. Saint Lucia's tourism industry scored another winning occasion as the third annual dive festival carves a new niche market for the island as a romance destination. The festival served as a platform for an underwater wedding Thursday morning. Here's Janelle Norville. Meet Julie and Sean, the couple who took their love for scuba diving to the next level by taking the plunge literally in an underwater wedding. The couple's wedding features prominently as the highlight of Saint Lucia's dive festival 2019. The idea was brought to the fore when travel agent Julie Gilchrist participated in the 2018 dive fest farm. She spoke to officials at the Saint Lucia Tourism Authority about making the idea a reality and they did just that. The couple who hails from Ontario, Canada following their underwater wedding had their destination wedding at the Royalton Saint Lucia Resort and Spa where the couple was accompanied by 22 family members and friends from the USA. Scuba diving is a passion for us. It's something that early in our relationship we had the opportunity to share together. We love the ocean. We love Saint Lucia. It just seemed to be a good quest. It just made perfect sense to do it this way. We met several years ago and we just fell instantly in love and it's been a long time to get to where we are now and we're so happy that the day's finally here and we can start the rest of our lives together. And I was here last year for the last dive fam trip. I'm a travel agent with the travel agent next door and we were here to experience the dive fam and the tourism board and I started talking about this and what a great idea this would be to have this happen and so we made it happen. And here we are. The wedding was officiated by diver attached to Tikai Resort and Spa, Lester Lawrenceon. With 14 years under his belt, Lawrenceon had never participated in an underwater wedding before. He indicated that he was nervous at first but just like a fish, as soon as he entered the water it was all systems go. The ceremony went on smoothly without a hitch. The Tikai Resort and Spa crew also participated in other activities scheduled under DIFES 2019. Lawrenceon explained that the market appears to be growing bigger and bigger every year. Every year we get a whole lot of beginner divers coming along, you know, people who have never done it before. They come in, they get a taste and they're hooked, training down there, introduction to diving, certification. So, you know, people just basically come here to get certified. People actually do part of the course, you know, brought at home. And they come here just to enjoy our reefs in St. Lucia. The St. Lucia Tourism Authority continues to promote DIFES as another niche in addition to romance, culinary adventure, family health and wellness, and sports to name a few. Newlywed Julie Gilchrist and Sean Gillan's wedding represents a merger between the romance and DIFES niches. DIFES 2019 encompasses a number of activities, including a DIFES treasure hunt, lionfish derby, photo seminar competition, famed dinners, street fiestas and island tours. Public relations officer of the St. Lucia Tourism Authority, Geraint George's, indicated that the festival targets dive enthusiasts the world over and six to solidify St. Lucia as a dive destination. So, this is the third year the product is growing. We have Erdie George who is the lead on it and who's making one that's happened with DIFES. And with the growth that we have seen with the festival, we know that it is going to be bigger and better in years to come. So, apart from the lionfish derby and the underwater wedding, we also have the street parties, the themed dinners. Later today, there'll be this underwater dive coin treasure hunt. So, there's quite a few things happening to really top off DIFES this year. The third annual St. Lucia DIFES festival is being hosted by the St. Lucia Divers Association and the St. Lucia Tourism Authority and is slated for the 8th to the 15th September 2019. Resorts and dive shops participated in DIFES 2019 include Bay Gardens Resorts, Cocopam Resorts, Marigold Beach Club and Dive Resort, Island Divers at Tikai Resort and Spa, Winged Jammer Landing, Sugar Beach, Action Adventures, Island Divers, Dive Fair Helen, Ionola Dive Adventures and Eastern Caribbean Divers. For the Government Information Service, I am Janelle Norville. The third cohort of vendors from the castries market have completed training under the OECS Regional Tourism Competitiveness Project, the ORTCP. The week-long training workshop was designed to build the capacity of vendors and forms part of the ORTCP's support for the upgrade of the castries market and surrounding areas. The recent training program for vendors of the castries market is the third of its kind. The program, which was undertaken by the Ministry of Tourism, Information and Broadcasting, Culture and Creative Industries, is part of the OECS Regional Tourism Competitiveness Project, the ORTCP, sought to sensitize vendors about the project, focusing on activities relating to the redevelopment of castries and the central market. Communications liaison with the project, Techna Fontanade, says training will ultimately enhance the tourism product offerings in St. Lucia. What we are doing with this skills training is to show them how other markets across the region and the world, how vendors cooperate in the market, how they specialize in giving an authentic experience to visitors so that we get more visitors going into the market, having a nice local experience and spending more. During the 5-day training program, vendors listen to presentations from the St. Lucia Bureau of Standards, Exp. St. Lucia, Belfand and TVET on the requisite standards and certifications for offering goods and services, the importance of product quality, as well as good business management and customer relations. Participants describe the training as educational and transformative. I really do think every vendor on the island of St. Lucia should come aboard and do this training so that they will have a better idea how to go along with business and how to operate as a small business person because one, we do not just sell for St. Lucia, but we sell internationally, regionally and locally. And we as a small business person, we need to enhance ourselves. We need to enhance our business. We need to be more proactive. We need to think long-term and not short-term because the world now is going regional, international. A repeat participant, Phallus Baptist, says there is always room for improvement when dealing with customers. It helps us vendors to broaden our awareness of our products and customer service, how to handle the guests, how to treat the guests better, how to boost ourselves. And also it's more like a positive impact on us, upgrading our skills when it comes to dealing with the foreigners or local customers. Vendors received a certificate for their participation in the training exercise. The Monetary Council registered its no objection to the decision of the Eastern Caribbean Central Bank, the ECCB, to approve the application for the transfer of the assets and liabilities of the Bank of Nova Scotia to Republic Financial Holdings Limited. This decision was taken at its meeting convened on the 6th of September 2019. As with most ECCB member countries, the government of St. Lucia will proceed to approve the requisite banking business vesting order for the Republic Financial Holdings Limited to acquire the Bank of Nova Scotia's operations in St. Lucia. To this end, the government wishes to invite the public and or private entities to consider the many investment opportunities which may arise as a result of this transaction. The government will continue to monitor the process to the Department of Finance to ensure a smooth transfer of operations and urge all St. Lucia's to stay tuned to developments in the financial sector. The Department of the Public Service is continuing to build capacity among senior personnel by providing training through the UV Open Campus. More in this report from Miguel Morisette. Approximately 40 senior public officers will undergo comprehensive training with the aim of enhancing their knowledge and skills in project management. Classes run concurrently one in the morning and one in the evening on Tuesdays and Thursdays. The first of nine sessions began on Tuesday the 10th of September at the University of the West Indies Open Campus. Betty Blanchard is the Acting Deputy Permanent Secretary in the Department of the Public Service. The Department of the Public Service has collaborated with the University of the West Indies to provide training in the area of project management to our senior officers that is permanent secretaries deputy permanent secretaries and other senior officers. Currently there are a number of projects being undertaken in the public service and we saw the need to enhance the skills of our officers in order for them to execute their task in a more efficient and effective manner. The training has been facilitated by Betty Comby, facilitator of project management, UV Open Campus. Project management is a very important body of knowledge. I can't stress that enough and I like to use the example of a wedding versus a marriage. So before wedding it's a project and so project management comes into play but there's also the important body of knowledge called quality management is related to operational work. So the wedding is the project but the marriage is operational work and so you really need to know those two bodies of knowledge and the same thing in a workplace. You have projects which have a beginning and an end and you get a unique result but you have this ongoing repetitive work and that is operational work. So this course is focusing on the project work and how do you manage the project work effectively and efficiently. First of all they will be involved in preparing project charters, project plans, right? So they should then be able to even analyze projects and decide what went wrong, what went right. It should make them more competent as far as managing projects. Program officer at the UV Open Campus, Yulampa Polyu Springer, applauds government for their collaboration and has extended the initiative to private organizations. We are the University of the West Indies. We belong to the government of the people and people of St. Lucia and we are hoping that more institutions, the government has started and it is a step in the right direction and we're hoping that more organizations can come to us with a view of us assisting as much as possible with training in especially continued professional education areas. Upon successful completion of the project management course, participants will receive a UV Open Campus St. Lucia Certificate of Achievement. From the communication unit in the Department of the Public Service, Miguel Morris is reporting. And this is the NTN Nightly. Ryan O'Brien is up next. I can feel my heart. Power up the air to replace the baguette on the floor. Mangee, we made a factory quickly. As you can see, as soon as the car is on that, exchange to prepare for the load package when you. As you can see, car is in good condition. Cooperate with each via pievoire, keep with car. Seasons cyclone, se j'en pour novembre. Les préparations, c'est toute la nuit, par école. C'est un commission par group management des arts piefort et classe management des arts en St. Lucie et financé par l'Agence pour développement ethionational amerique Bureau Assistance des Arts Lot P.E. Welcome back. We join Ryan O'Brien for the latest happenings in youth development and sports. Thanks, Niger. Welcome everyone to your nightly update from youth development and sports on the NTN Nightly News. I'm Ryan O'Brien. The St. Lucia Tourism Authority hosted its ninth annual showcase, September 8th to the 13th, starting with a charity cricket match at Horsham Cricket Club in Sussex. The St. Lucia Tourism Authority organized the event called Bat for a Cause on Sunday, September 8th to raise much needed funds for the St. Lucia Diabetes Project UK and the hurricane relief efforts in the Bahamas. Minister for Tourism Information Broadcasting, Culture and the Creative Industries, the Honourable Dominic Fede, was the official host of the inaugural charity cricket match. The Minister's 11 included Prime Minister, the Honourable Alan Shasne, and cricket legend Darren Goff. His team took on the opponents for the day, the British Buccaneers, consisting of hotel partners, travel media and tour operators. Each team played 2020 style, one innings each. The British Buccaneers batted first and at lunch were 139 all out. Prime Minister Shasne and Minister Fede opened the batting. The Prime Minister was caught out for 10, which led the way for Darren Goff to rock up the score. He quickly achieved an unbeaten 50. The Minister's 11 went on to secure a convincing victory. The event raised 8,000 pounds for the Diabetes Charity, which will go towards providing medicines, along with training for staff and support and education for clients. A further 3,000 pounds raised for the hurricane relief efforts in the Bahamas. The aim of the UK showcase is to update UK industry partners on St Lucia's tourism developments and to hear from key operators, airlines and agents and what they need to market the destination to its optimum. Organisers of the Caribbean Children's Charity Shield Football Tournament are pleased with the success of the tournament as the participating teams get a chance to show their skills and build self-esteem. The boys training centre entered a team in the under 17 category and was recognized for their discipline, being named most disciplined team and making it to the semifinals of the tournament. When we first went to St Lucia, we wanted to add a charity part of the tournament and we were linked to the boys training centre and we are very glad and very elated actually that the boys training centre from St Lucia are able to be part of this tournament here in Grenada this year and we are hoping that they will be able to continue their journey with us as we move on to Barbados in year 2020 with this tournament and we also have other teams here who come from poverty and as I said stigmatize a marginalized community who have never even touched a football, who were rejected from other teams. We have the boys training centre whose main focus is not football but we are using football as a tool to help empower and help move them from one situation into another. Brown said she was very pleased with the involvement of the team from the boys training centre and was looking forward to their participation in future tournaments. That's your update from youth development and sports for today. I'm Ryan O'Brien. Thanks Ryan. A non-profit organization focused on empowering rural women is continuing to positively impact the lives of women in the agriculture sector. Since 2016, Helen's daughters has been making a case for the economic development of rural women through improved market access, adaptive agricultural techniques and capacity building. The latest initiative undertaken by the organization is a rural women's academy. Eklene Kuru is the organization's president. We started out with advocacy then that led to capacity development which our training programs like for example we just launched our six month rural women's academy that's at alias forces and now what we're doing is we've created a social enterprise and in a sort of way a women's cooperative you could say that facilitates the sale of these women's produce to the hotel sector. The organization's president says that while it does take some time to get to rural women, partner organizations have made the process a lot easier. With women, I think that the mindset is that a man is a farmer. Though people go to the market, the castries market and so on, they see most women but they think of them as over days, as vendors but they don't realize that a lot of these women are actually doing both jobs, farming and vending. There are definitely some helpful partners that we have for example the sedition network of rural women. The president is Robin Darrell and she's been quite instrumental in highlighting some of our programs and pushing their members towards our programs and so on so in that regard there are a few rural women's groups that are linked to Helen's daughters. Helen's daughters was developed out of a winning proposal for UN Women's Empower Women Champions for Change program and stay with the NTN Nightly. Up next, Primus Hutchinson is here with the NTN Nouvelle Aquillon. Was that an earthquake? No. What do you do when there's an earthquake? Drop cover and hold on. Where does that mean? You drop to the ground, take cover underneath a sturdy table or disk and hold on until the shaking stops. Where there's no table or desk. Stay away from the walls windows and always use your hands to cover your head and face and crouch in a corner of the building. But what if you're outside? What's an open space away from buildings, trees, street lights and utility wires? Drop to your knees, protect your head with your arms and wait for the shaking to stop. Welcome back. We join Primus Hutchinson for the NTN Nouvelle Aquillon. Minister de Santé, Chef Officier des Affaires Nuité, Minister de Santé, Minister de Santé, Monsieur de Santé, Monsieur de Santé, Even Mr. Fuisala has served. He has served to continue his life. There is never a single piece of food that dies on the streets. He has never done anything wrong. So, I would like to advise Mr. Fuisala not to forget to share this video with all the research that he has done. Research of science that I have done. All the information about the benefits of Mr. Fuisala. Mr. Fuisala's video is about his father, mother-in-law, mother-in-law, mother-in-law and mother-in-law. According to Mr. Fuisala's official chef, Mr. Fuisala has a lot of benefits that will help to protect his mother-in-law. Mr. Fuisala also has a lot of benefits that will help to correct the problem that is a lot of problems. Mr. Fuisala has a lot of benefits that will help to correct the problem that is a lot of problems. So, Mr. Fuisala, as you said, I would like to encourage Mr. Fuisala to tell you that Mr. Fuisala has a lot of benefits that will help to correct the problem. Mr. Fuisala has a lot of benefits that will help to correct the problem that is a lot of problems. So, Mr. Fuisala, as you said, I would like to encourage Mr. Fuisala to tell you that Mr. Fuisala has a lot of benefits that will help to correct the problem I'm going to go out and visit you with the intelligence you deserve, which is a large thought-planet. Your chef knows the Saudi public. He's a Jew. He declared that let's take a film. It's the first time I've ever heard you say that. And I'm going to try to find the truth behind it. Our Jew said that when you have children and you don't find anything, and you don't find anything, then you have to go out and visit the hospital. He added that it's easier to find a way to let's take a film. It's the first time I've ever heard you say that. The World Health Organization, the WHO, declared that let's take a film. It's the first time I've ever heard you say that. It's not only the health care that's needed, more than 800,000 children are living there every year. Most of them are in the embassy, in the village. But also, they have to take care of their children when they're sick and they're sick. The World Health Organization, the WHO, I have to make a recommendation that it's the time when you start buying the food, it's the first time you can do it. It's just to continue. I'm just going to go out and visit the country for six months. After that, I go out and buy a lot of food. But I'm going to tell my mother that I'm going to continue, to buy food and to continue buying the food to just stay in the neighbor place always. The head of this country, Kawebla, that's Oissiensla, I have a decision to assist Bahamas country after there were damages that the life that is lost in Wieseltrap, that's Issy-Claude-Durian. The head of P.E.O.S.S.S.S.S.L.A. for a decision to assist Bahamas country after there were damages that the life that is lost in Wieseltrap, that's Issy-Claude-Durian. This is what the same organization or the same PED examiners do. We have a special guest to assist the director general of the OECS, Dr. Dedicus Jules, to talk about this initiative and how Dorian will help us understand that we are not for long-term and that we have a country that can help us. There is also the fact that we all have incredible connections. We have a situation that Dorian has to face. We all have to help our family. Dr. Jules said that it is the only thing that Bahamas can do. It is the only thing that this country has to do. We have also helped this Dominic, BVI, BABYODER, and Anguilla. I hope Bahamas will be able to share their reality with us. It is the only thing that this country has to do. The director general of the OECS said yes, we are able to help this country, but we are also able to assist the OECS. This is Dorian from Bahamas. He is the director general of the OECS. This is the only thing that has to do with the history of Bahamas. The people of Bahamas are going to continue to count on the people who lost their lives to continue to grow. That is the only thing that has to do with this country. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen, for your support. I hope that the next time we will be able to help this country, we will be able to help this country. That is why I hope that this country will be able to help us. Partly cloudy to cloudy skies with scattered showers and a chance of isolated thunderstorms over the northern Wynwood Island, further south, fair to partly cloudy skies with a few showers. The tropical wave located a few hundred miles east of the Lesser Antilles is no longer associated with an area of low pressure. The wave continues to move slowly westward, near 12 miles per hour or 19 kilometers per hour. Moisture and instability associated with this wave is expected to affect the region from later today. Two other tropical waves located over the central and eastern tropical Atlantic are moving westward near 15 miles per hour or 24 kilometers per hour. Some slow development of the eastern tropical Atlantic wave is possible during the next few days. The tide for Castries Harbor was high at 3.13 p.m. and will be low again at 8.29 p.m. The tide for Yehfor Bay was high at 4.20 p.m. and will be low again at 9.56 p.m. The sea is slight to moderate with waves 3 to 5 feet or 0.9 to 1.5 meters. The sun will rise Friday at 5.52 a.m. And that brings us to the end of the NTN Nightly. Join us next time at 7 p.m. with a repeat at 7 a.m. You can also catch up with us any time on the Saint Lucia Government Facebook page or YouTube channel. I'm Nisha Tross.