 Mr. Speaker, with your permission, I rise in support of the motion before Dishonourable House and that motion is the estimate of expenditure and revenue 2020-2024 in the amount of $1.8 billion, Mr. Speaker. But, Mr. Speaker, before I speak on the issue before us, I seek your permission, Mr. Speaker, to recognize and to thank the people of my constituency of Souffre for Shajat, for the privilege afforded me to represent them. It is a responsibility that I take very seriously and pledge to do my best to serve with empathy and integrity. Mr. Speaker, I also want to take this moment to thank Dishonourable Prime Minister for afforded me the opportunity to serve in his cabinet. I'm also grateful to my cabinet colleagues and the staff of my ministry for their support throughout the year, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, I stand here today, in addition to supporting the motion before us, to present to the people on behalf of the people that we represent my report and performance at the Ministry of Commerce, Manufacturing, Business Development, Corporatives and Consumer Affairs. Mr. Speaker, we've been asked as a government to be accountable and the work of my ministry was included in the last estimate, which is for the year 2022-23, and I will also speak on the work programme for 2023-24. Mr. Speaker, as I am back on this very potent exercise, I am very optimistic, notwithstanding the myriad of challenges which we encountered over the past year, in particular as a result of the adverse impact of extended shocks and geopolitical forces which acted on our economy, in conjunction with our own domestic resource constraints. For most, Mr. Speaker, is the wave of price increases from across the globe, which I described last year as the elephant in the room. As we now know too well, Mr. Speaker, this elephant in the room of rising inflation dealt a debilitating blow to our businesses and consumers alike. As a highly open and import-dependent economy, Mr. Speaker, this global price impulses ripples through the domestic economy in a form of cost-push of import inflation. We've flooded in increases in the consumer price index and in all sub-indices causing accelerated inflation in the country. This trend of rising prices, Mr. Speaker, pose major challenges to us in the government and especially for our private sector, which face systemic delays and freight and order logistical challenges, which together resulted in higher costs for inputs and finished products. As a consequence, Mr. Speaker, we have all had to face higher prices, goods and services, which effectively reduced our purchasing power, our level of consumption, and ultimately our standard of living. Mr. Speaker, this was particularly painful for the more vulnerable segments of our economy, of our society, as they were forced to make very difficult choices between basic food commodities and other necessities for survival. So, Mr. Speaker, in the face of this harsh reality, what did our government do? Mr. Speaker, we may recall significant pushback as we had shortages in sugar, but more than anything else, what I want to speak about, Mr. Speaker, are the actions that our Prime Minister, as the Minister for Finance, took to support the vulnerable. And I will speak to that in a lot more detail when I speak about some of the activities in my ministry. So, Mr. Speaker, as I look at the estimate of expenditure before us, I note that my ministry on the head 42 has been given an allocation of $19.9 million, Mr. Speaker, for this fiscal year. With $9.4 million allocated to smaller projects and the remaining $10.5 million being programmed to cover recurrent expenditure. Mr. Speaker, the Ministry of Commerce has bought four main departments. Commerce and industry, which include SEDU, consumer affairs, the cooperatives, departments, and we have the import monitoring, Mr. Speaker. The projects that we are looking at, Mr. Speaker, and we have the Love Sanctucia campaign, which has an allocation of $100,000. We have our flagship project, which is the MSME loan grant facility of $8.3 million. We have our young entrepreneurs in action with some $65,000. We have the Digital Enhancement Program for $136,190. We have a control substance regulatory authority that most of us would associate with cannabis, Mr. Speaker. And we have $500,000. We have the retrofitting of the January Fisher's Cooperative, the Supra Fisher's Cooperatives. And that is with a total of $275,000. And we have an allocation of $57,900. So the purchase of equipment for the ministry, Mr. Speaker. I would say a very lean budget, but, Mr. Speaker, with great potential outreach. Mr. Speaker, the allocation also covers two of our specialized agencies within our remit of the ministry, and that is Exports Sanctucia and the broad standards with allocations of $1.96 million and $981 million respectively. Mr. Speaker, we are very grateful for this allocation, and we will do our best to utilize the limited resources available to us to implement our program of works over the coming year in as judicious and impactful a manner as possible. Against this backdrop, Mr. Speaker, permit me to present to you in greater detail some of the highlights of our 2022-23 fiscal year on the various programs and initiatives which we have focused on, albeit in some reform, or also give an indication of what is planned for the fiscal year 2023-2024. On the commerce and industry, Mr. Speaker, we have an allocation of $10.37 million. Of this amount, $2.9 million will be put towards operating expenses, and the remaining $7.47 million towards the financing of the various capital projects being undertaken by the two units. In particular, Mr. Speaker, Seidu, which is more commonly known as a small business development center, is a department responsible for the nurturing of our micro-small media enterprises, providing hand-rolling support from business concept to completion. In the coming financial year, our flagship project is the much anticipated MSME loan brand facility. Mr. Speaker, you may recall in my address to this honorable house last year, I alluded to the very real challenge of limited access to finances faced by our MSMEs. This challenge, Mr. Speaker, has served as a near insurmountable barrier to the launch of many small businesses, even those with viable business ideas. In response, Mr. Speaker, I announced that we would launch a loan brand facility to assist the MSMEs. Although we encountered significant delays in bringing this initiative to fruition in the current fiscal year, I am pleased to inform our small businesses, many of whom have waited patiently for the crisis to be heard, that I am happy to be bearers of the good news today, that the MSME loan brand facility was launched on March 16th this year, and our doors at the ministry are now open from March 20th, Mr. Speaker, to receive applications. Mr. Speaker, this facility will provide us with the means to fuel the growth of these small enterprises in need of financial support to expand the businesses through the purchase of inputs and equipment or the acquisition of training and marketing services. Mr. Speaker, this is all part of our effort as we promised to restore and do so to a level of stability by creating and enabling environment for wealth creation and employment, and by providing much needed support to the backbone of our economy, our small businesses. To us, this end, Mr. Speaker, the sum of EC 8.3 million, which is a CDB loan fund, has been allocated in the budget in the fiscal year. The persons who are going to qualify, Mr. Speaker, should be between the ages of 41 years and 60 years, and they can receive capital through a blend of grant funding, which is 70 percent, and 30 percent concessionary loans, Mr. Speaker, with an interest rate of 3 percent. Mr. Speaker, I believe the average person who would say, move can beat that. All classes of businesses tend to benefit. Preventures, and that is persons who want to start a business or businesses already in existence. This initiative, Mr. Speaker, we are hoping to cover some 500 FSNAs. I want to pause here to echo the sentiment of the honorable Prime Minister at the launch of this program and encourage businesses to use this opportunity to build wealth. And I remember the Prime Minister quoted, a life of luxuries on knives, but generational wealth sounds better. Build something that outlifts you. So, Mr. Speaker, in order to prepare our entrepreneurs adequately to reap the full benefits available under that program, we have taken some initiatives, namely, one, the entrepreneurial development program, Mr. Speaker, and that is, again, through Selu, where we have trained over 600 small businesses during this fiscal year. And, Mr. Speaker, we did this by focusing on developing financial literacy. We did this through a number of virtual workshops and seminars. We had sessions in business model workshop, introduction to financials, the small business tax filing workshop, for example. Mr. Speaker, Selu has been working to foster an understanding of the fundamentals of business for persons seeking to start a business through the business startup essential workshop, as well as the design thinking to develop a business idea workshop, Mr. Speaker. The unit also held a train, the train of workshop, in conjunction with the Taiwanese International Corporation and Development Fund, the ICDF, aimed at building the capacity to develop entrepreneurs in the area of e-commerce and marketing strategy, for instance. Mr. Speaker, I want to pause at this moment to thank the government and people of Taiwan through Ambassador Peter Chen for the cooperation and support provided to my ministry and to the people of Central Asia. Mr. Speaker, we embarked on a sensitization program and we call it a business forum drive throughout various communities in 2022. This was hosted and we did this in collaboration with other government ministries, Central Asia Development Bank, Export Central Asia, the Bureau of Standards, Ministry of Tourism, Ministry of Agriculture. We came together as one government and we had the individual parliamentary representatives, had to host us, and we went around and I think we had about seven constituencies so far, with the Souffre, Grosile, Castris East, Babono, Souzel, Castris South East, and I did a short session at Viewfort North between May 2022 and March 2023. This drive focused on the support services and programs offered on Ireland by our government, Mr. Speaker, and so far approximately 300 small businesses have participated to date, Mr. Speaker. We intend to continue these sessions, Mr. Speaker, and as my information goes, next in line is the constituency of Miku North and the constituency of Miku South. Two constituencies are in line to follow, Mr. Speaker, but my ministry we are available with all the other constituencies to ensure that every community understands this program, Mr. Speaker. The first program we got into was the SBDC Youth Entrepreneurs in Action, Mr. Speaker, and in August last year, 2022, our small business unit worked with the Ministry of Education and the fourth, the students of the fourth and fifth forms, we had 40 students, Mr. Speaker, that were assigned to our small enterprises and there was an exchange of experiences and I am extremely pleased that we are going to have a second cohort this year and the Minister for Finance has allocated some $65,000, Mr. Speaker, to this program. On the combos and industry again, Mr. Speaker, which represents a second set of support provided by my ministry, this department has is which caters to sectoral development across our business community has been given an allocation of $236,300 to implement its ongoing projects and programs in the community and Mr. Speaker, that flagship program for combos and industry is the digital enhancement program, Mr. Speaker and this program will be launched I think tomorrow morning, Mr. Speaker and what is in this program? This program, Mr. Speaker, is funded, is getting support from the organization of American states and it is to support St. Lucia to shift to the digital economy. The project, the project is encouraging persons to embrace the e-commerce platforms in St. Lucia and to facilitate the onboarding and regular use of these platforms for our private sector and in particular our small businesses. Mr. Speaker, this symposium is just the first step in this government's march towards incorporating e-commerce and the wider digital technology into our private sector. As the project moves forward, we will also be supporting the local platforms and the MSMEs in introducing this means of transacting business to the St. Lucia consumer, allowing the plumber from Souffre to be online and allowing the business houses in Grozile and the small producer in Souffre to complete a digital transaction and deliver the goods into Babono. So, Mr. Speaker, to further advance this project in the coming financial year, an amount of EC $136,190 has been allocated, which includes $90,833 which is the OES grant and $46,357 in bonds as government counterpart contribution. Mr. Speaker, the next program and project that we are working on at the ministry is our love St. Lucia campaign, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we have a budget this year of $100,000 for this campaign, Mr. Speaker, and I believe that as a government, we must lead by example, Mr. Speaker, and when we thought of the expenditure of central government, we felt it was important that central government and the procurement officers in central government, we felt it was important for them to know what is produced locally and for them to have understood that the issue of quality was not in question and that they had to make a concerted effort to support local industry. So, that is what is behind the love St. Lucia campaign, Mr. Speaker. So, what did we do at the ministry? We embarked on a training workshop and later a symposium that sought to bring stakeholders together, private sector suppliers of goods and services and public sector purchasing officers and decision makers. The message at this event, Mr. Speaker, was clear and is one I wish to reiterate here to be to public officials and to consuming public, and that is that St. Lucia produces a wide range of quality goods and services that meet national and international standards. Our manufacturers and service providers across the country are not asking consumers or the government to lower the standards of sacrifice performance for the sake of buying local. Rather, they want to show that they can and will compete with imports. All they ask is that we break the stigma that foreign goods are better and urge that the buying public also consider the value proposition as captured in the goods and services they offer. You will be pleasantly surprised and be satisfied. Mr. Speaker, within our budget, I am pleased that an important intervention which we have, which is the annual St. Lucia-Taiwan Partnership Trade Show, which we've had for several years and which requires support for expansion. I noted that we received an additional $20,000 to expand this program, Mr. Speaker. In the past, the Ministry of Commerce has gone out to augment its efforts at showcasing new and upcoming enterprise entrepreneurs, while also supporting the bigger names under our preview. Along with our export promotion agency, Export St. Lucia, we introduced novel and additional initiatives to provide support to our MSME sector, including our first annual Laplace Noel, which featured a Christmas Spring exhibition. And there we had over 30 participants, Mr. Speaker. This was similarly we had another initiative, which was our Independence Expo, which took place in downtown Tastres. And there we had about 70 business houses participating. And there we did this with the support of the Ministry of Tourism and Events in Lucia. And again, Mr. Speaker, this is all in our effort to support local enterprise and our small businesses. Mr. Speaker, under our consumer affairs, we have, as I mentioned earlier, the issue of inflation. And I want to point out that with the support of our Honorable Prime Minister, in an effort to reduce or to reduce the impact of rising prices, especially in the first half of the fiscal year, 2022-23, as a government to remove the custom service charge of 6% on the importation of all non-fuel price control goods, with the exception of bread, bulk rice, sugar and flour, because these items were already subsidized. Mr. Speaker, this came at a cost of 3.23 million in revenue for gone by this government, Mr. Speaker. But, Mr. Speaker, we did not stop there. We went further to ensure that the price of rice, flour and sugar remain unchanged despite significant increases in the contract price of these items. And I'll give some examples. The price of rice in 2021-22 was $87 a bag. In 2022-23, it rose to $97, an increase of 11.75%. White flour was $99 in 2021-22, and it rose to $144 in the year 2022-23, Mr. Speaker. A 45% increase. Brown sugar, $21.22 was $73 a bag, Mr. Speaker. And for 2022-23, it was at $92.71, an increase of $26, an increase of 26%, Mr. Speaker. With all these increases, Mr. Speaker, our government ensured that the price to the consumer remain the same. This cost our government in subsidies, a whopping $14.2 million, Mr. Speaker, for the year in question. So, Mr. Speaker, on behalf of John Public, I want to thank the Honorable Prime Minister for ensuring that, as a government, we took all steps to ensure that centrusions continue to have bread on the table, Mr. Speaker. And that is an example. While the price of flour was $99, in May 2022, we sold a bag of flour to the baker at $85. So, there was a $14 subsidy in May 2022. With an increase, when the bakers were threatening to increase the price of bread in June 2022, Mr. Speaker, we sat with them and pleaded with them. And for the month of June, Mr. Speaker, while the government purchased a bag of flour for $99, we sold it to the bakers at $35, Mr. Speaker. So, for each bag of flour, for the month of June, the government subsidized each bag of flour by $64, Mr. Speaker. Between June to July to September 2022, the government purchased a bag of flour for $144, Mr. Speaker, and sold it to the baker at $60. The government subsidized a bag of flour by $84, Mr. Speaker. $84, Mr. Speaker. And in October, in October 2022, to December 2022, the government purchased a bag of flour for $144 and sold it to the baker at $50. So, between October to December, the government subsidized each bag of flour by $94, Mr. Speaker. By $94, Mr. Speaker. It is important, it is important, very important that we repeat. It is very important that we repeat and remind sent Lucians that this is a government. This is a government that have put the people first. So, Mr. Speaker, the subsidiary between April and December was $5.4 million, Mr. Speaker. So, Mr. Speaker, but you know as a government, we cannot continue, Mr. Speaker. I want to thank the Prime Minister for including in this year's estimate and expenditure a provision of $1 million to subsidize flour. But based on the exercise that we have done, it appears that if all things remain the same, if nothing changes, that subsidy might be $3.5 million, Mr. Speaker. So, in the area of our cooperatives, Mr. Speaker, this is a section that requires quite a bit of work, the cooperative movement. In the cooperative movement, we have financial and non-financial cooperatives. For the non-financial cooperatives, we focus a bit on the official cooperatives. And with the help of the Ministry of Infrastructure, we have performed infrastructure and electrical assessment on each of the official cooperatives. I want to thank the minister and his staff for that support. And, Mr. Speaker, we are now through an allocation of $275,000 focusing on three official cooperatives at the moment. Then we official cooperatives, Souffre and Ansari. We are hoping to get additional funding to focus on the other five official cooperatives, Mr. Speaker. Thank you almost well. Mr. Speaker, our financial cooperatives at the credit unions are doing well, but I want to inform the league and the members of the cooperative unions that the draft legislation, we are working on the draft legislation, and I want to thank the AG and his staff for his support in that area, Mr. Speaker. Under the area of cannabis, Mr. Speaker, we've done quite a bit, but I want to report that for the year 2021-22, we had an allocation of $120,000. And for 2022-23, we have an allocation of $500,000, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, the task force created under this administration over the last year, heavily assisted by stakeholders and engaged consultants, left no stone unturned, and has now presented a draft control substance bill, Mr. Speaker. We have this document now, and I want to ensure the general public through you, Mr. Speaker, that the next two months, we will engage key stakeholders before we come to this honorable house with this bill, Mr. Speaker. For the St. Lucia Bureau of Standards, Mr. Speaker. For the St. Lucia Bureau of Standards, Mr. Speaker, with a budget of $981,000, the Bureau has a mission to strengthen the national quality infrastructure in order to contribute to the advancement of the national economy, support sustainable development, promote health and safety of consumers, and protect the environment, and to facilitate trade, Mr. Speaker. The work of the St. Lucia Bureau of Standards is critical if we are to increase our exports, Mr. Speaker. Export St. Lucia, Mr. Speaker, I move to provide an update on the work of Export St. Lucia. In our manifesto, we pledge to establish export market development assistance programs through the provision of technical assistance to develop export marketing strategies for our small businesses, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, following on a contraction of 14.7% in 2020, that is the exports. Pleased to report that export grew by 13.4 million in 2021 and by 4.8 million in 2022. Likewise, Mr. Speaker, available data on the manufacturing sector shows pronounced increases in the output of oil subsectors. Mr. Speaker, this did not happen by accident, but by deliberate effort to increase both volume and value of our island's exports. In support of this trend, Mr. Speaker, export St. Lucia embarked on a number of new initiatives and projects during the year in review. This included the export the runway, taste of St. Lucia's store at Point Seraphim, and the CDB Parkhouse Projects. And this Parkhouse Project, Mr. Speaker, impacts the agricultural sector. We have quite a few success stories from the work of Export St. Lucia, Mr. Speaker, and this augurs well for our product development, marketing and export potential going forward. So, Mr. Speaker, having provided you with this synopsis of the work of my ministry and its constituent patch over the last fiscal year and an indication of what we plan to do this coming year, I will now try to focus on my constituency, Mr. Speaker. How much time do I have, Mr. Speaker? I have not used much time. Was that? I have 20? Okay, good. Mr. Speaker, I'll focus on what we have achieved and then focus on what projects, Mr. Speaker. For my constituency, in addition to relying on central government, Mr. Speaker, we tried to go outside and see how we could try to help ourselves. And we had what you call our funders forum, Mr. Speaker. But firstly, I want to say what we have achieved under our CDP program, Mr. Speaker. And I'm seeing the CDP on the head 56. But what we have achieved with our million dollars, Mr. Speaker, we have, we have, we, we end up with some 58 contracts, Mr. Speaker. 30 of these contracts were completed during the, up to, up to March this year. And we have 28 projects ongoing, Mr. Speaker. But I want to summarize the work that we have done under the CDP, Mr. Speaker. We've done significant drainage work in Foshengiak in particular, because Foshengiak has a water problem, especially during the rainy season, that can cause significant problems for not only Foshengiak, but suffering in particular. So between Foshengiak and Mini, we've done quite a bit of what I would call work that is the responsibility of my colleague minister, minister for infrastructure. We focus quite a bit as well, Mr. Speaker, on safety and determined that we are going to paint all our speed bumps around the constituency. We, again, partnered with infrastructure and presented, we went into the installation of guardrails. Both, we've done that in the Foshengiak region in particular, where we had a lot of slopes and areas that we felt was unsafe. And we continue that program. And part of that will be the Castry Souffle Road as well. Under our CDP as well, Mr. Speaker, we started the Bhutan Community Center, Mr. Speaker. And from all indications, that is about 85% complete, Mr. Speaker. We renovated a foot bridge which connects the new development area with the Wingsville area, Mr. Speaker. This bridge was originally in plywood and it posed significant problems to our school children. It was a threat. And under the CDP, we were able to do this. As well under the CDP program, we were able to go out to start work. We are going to start work on the Fort-Bernier Park, Mr. Speaker. So for CDP, I am extremely pleased with the work that we are doing with these funds. We are also going to do some remedial work on the Fongenli Road, Mr. Speaker, providing drainage. Some sidewalks for Fort-Bernier will do some drainage work in new development as well as Barron's Rive, Mr. Speaker. So that is under the CDP. Some of the other works we are doing, Mr. Speaker, under the social, I would call that social infrastructure, we have four projects going. Lenny Hills Park, and we're trying to get some funding from the Tourism Enhancement Fund, the Souffre Street Scape. Again, on the Tourism Enhancement Fund, Mr. Speaker, the New Development Park, and that we are working together with one of the hotels and that is Sugar Beach to try to put that together. And the Fort-Bernier Park, as I said, will be under the CDP project, Mr. Speaker. Under the economic infrastructure, Mr. Speaker, we are looking at the development of the Souffre Waterfront under the GPH project, Mr. Speaker. I was particularly pleased with the public consultation on that project. Mr. Speaker, under physical infrastructure, and with the help of the National Lottery and the Ministry for Youth and Sports, we worked on the cricket pitches because, as you know, now Souffre does not have a cricket ground. So we are trying to put in the practice pitch for our cricketers. Mr. Speaker, we have a DPO operation in Souffre, yet our persons have difficulty getting employment. So one of the things that we're trying to do is to train our young people to prepare them for the job market. So there is a training component. Under social development, Mr. Speaker, we have a project for free public Wi-Fi across the constituency, which is going to impact Zeno, Wavin Clegg, St. Philip, Mini, Belvedere, Mocha, Fonsha Leed, Baron's Drive, Market Road, Victoria Road, Wingsville, and Mr. Speaker, we are getting support under the Universal Service Fund of the National Telecommunication Regulatory Commission, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, Souffre under the area of education, we had some poor performances, and after consultation with the schools, we have implemented an after-school program, and that is funded by the Souffre Regional Development Foundation, and some 76 children are receiving after-school care classes, including meals before they go to their homes, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, we have quite a bit of homeless people in Souffre, and we're trying to prepare and construct a home for the elderly and the homeless, Mr. Speaker. And I want to take this moment to thank the Djibouleh family for donating the land for this, and I am extremely happy when I look at the head on the equity, head 51, to try to get some funding for that project. Mr. Speaker, under our anti-harassment program, again, we are working with the SSDF who is assisting us with a social survey to see how we can intervene, especially for our young boys, Mr. Speaker. In the area of food security, Mr. Speaker, we have a program greenhouse repair in the Souffre schools, Mr. Speaker, and there we are searching for a sponsor, and I am extremely pleased under the head for agriculture, head 41, Mr. Speaker, that I can see us getting some support for our school program. We are also putting in a program, what we call a backyard gardening project, Mr. Speaker, for the community, and that is to increase food production, food security, and reliance for some 50 households as a pilot project, and there we are getting some support from WOSC, which is a Canadian institution, Mr. Speaker. Under social protection, under agriculture, Mr. Speaker, we went in and medecilled what you call a lake in the Pontchage Arc region, and that was to minimize flooding and to facilitate agriculture, and this project was successfully completed, Mr. Speaker. That was funded under the CDP program. Another CDP program is a provision of fertilizer to assist our farmers, and I await my colleague, Minister of Agriculture, so we can make this distribution. I also want to thank the Minister of Agriculture for the funds provided to our officials. Mr. Speaker, again, under agriculture, our Bellevue Farmers Cooperative, which is a very critical institution for us, we have come in with CDP funds, support from Exports and Russia, and support from World University of Canada, and we've done the following. Installation of greenhouses, assistance with seedlings, renovation of the office structure, and the construction and renovation of a chill room. All of this is to increase the shelf life of the products that our farmers are selling and to increase the market for our farmers, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, under education, we have three projects. One of them is renovation of the science lab at the Souffre Comprehensive Secondary School, and this was done with funding from the Souffre Regional Development Foundation. Mr. Speaker, again, we had a lot of pushback from the teachers of the Souffre Comprehensive Secondary School concerning the condition of the school, and I want to thank the Honourable Prime Minister for his support in allowing us, giving us the funding to construct a structure to accommodate three classrooms within the SCSS, Mr. Speaker. For the Souffre Primary School under BNTF 10, Mr. Speaker, there is a renovation of that school, a block in that school, and I have been informed that the tender documents are out for that, Mr. Speaker. So these are some of the things that we have done, Mr. Speaker, and as I look quickly under the 2023 estimates, Mr. Speaker, I want to look on Head 41, Ministry of Agriculture, Project 303322, and that is building resilience adaptation to climate change and climate vulnerability. I see some $26.6 million there, Mr. Speaker. There's a purchase of water pumps, tillers, farm equipment, and I know my farmers, particularly my farmers from Fonshajak, is going to welcome this particular project, Mr. Speaker. On the Project 90265 expansion of food crops, again, Mr. Speaker, under the eight crop program, training of farmers and supply of inputs is another project that the farmers of Souffre would welcome. Again, for the Ministry of Agriculture, the Cocoa Sector Enhancement Project is another project that we would welcome in the Souffre area, and especially the replanting of 78 acres of cocoa, Mr. Speaker. Again, on the agriculture, we have a project for $450,000 from the Taiwanese Enhancing Farm Mechanisation, and that is one that our farmers have been calling for. So I am extremely happy with my Minister of Agriculture, Mr. Speaker, and the Minister of Finance. On the Head 43, Mr. Speaker, infrastructure, I see some $3 million of road maintenance. We all know it is not enough, but I know that is what we can do for the moment, so I welcome it. I also see $1.6 million there for the road care taker program, and that is critical to keeping our surroundings, our island clean, and I know our caretakers would be happy. Mr. Speaker, the project that excites me a lot is Project 0317, Renewable Energy Sector Development Project, some $58 million, Mr. Speaker, and that's the Geo-formal Exploration Drilling in Belflin, Franché Jacques, and Solity Boost, Mr. Speaker. Mr. Speaker, this project has significant impact not only for the residents of Souffre in terms of work and everything else, but also as the Minister responsible for commerce. I am aware that the business community is screaming for alternative energy, and this has the impact, will have the impact, is successful to increase St. Lucia's competitiveness, especially our manufacturing sector, to reduce the cost of energy and, by extension, improve economic growth. So I really pray for the success of this project, Mr. Speaker. Under the Ministry of Tourism, Mr. Speaker, Project 0045, Community Tourism, some $34 million in there, Mr. Speaker, and I'm already looking for my Souffre Streetscape Program, as one of the projects that is going there, Mr. Speaker. My foundation, I'm closing Souffre, when I close Souffre, that is when you all are going to see. On the head 55, Mr. Speaker, Ministry of Housing, the projects of the National Housing and Assistant Program, Mr. Speaker, this is a critical project for us, and I'm really hoping, Mr. Minister, that this year, Souffre will receive its fair share. So I'm looking forward to being the next month or so that I'm coming to ensure that we get our fair share, Mr. Speaker. On the head 51, Equity, Mr. Speaker, Project 0059, the Home Care Program. Remember for Souffre, your five minutes left. Thank you, Mr. Speaker. Under that program of $8.2 million, Mr. Speaker, this is a program very close to my heart, because we are now, that program allows us as a government to take care of our elderly. It is a serious program, and I believe there is room for proper training of the workers there so that they too can move on to do other things. On the head 52, Ministry of Education, Mr. Speaker, of $2.7 million. I just want, I'm looking at my minister here, Mr. Speaker, but Souffre Comprehensive Secondary School, I am placing this on, I am pleading, get my teachers to be happier than they are. So, Mr. Minister, please. On the head 54, Youth Development, the Rehabilit Project 0408, Rehabilitation of Sports Facilities, I look forward to working with the minister to improve the Zeno open space, Mr. Speaker. This is critical for us. So, Mr. Speaker, when I look at this estimate before us, I believe it reflects a government that has sat together with our limited resources and tried to address the needs of the people. So, we have, especially, Mr. Speaker, for me, the subsidies we are able to provide day in, day out, not only for in the area of flower, but more so in the area of cooking gas for, especially, our single mothers. And to remind them that each time they go out and buy a tank of a 20-pound cylinder of gas that this government is subsidizing it by 20 dollars. That is something you have to remind them of every day, Mr. Speaker. So, as we look around and we continue to work, as we continue to work for the people, we gave them a commitment that we are going to put the people first and we continue to do so. So, I want to express profound gratitude, Mr. Speaker, to several persons, to my constituent of Fonsha Jacques for the enduring support and confidence in me, and for what we can do together. Our food soldiers, the counselors, the chairman, board, and staff of the Super Original Development Foundation. I want to thank my permanent secretary and my staff in the various departments, as well as the Associated Specialized Agencies, Slizba, Export Centrusha, Free Zone, Bureau of Standards. When I think of Chamber of Commerce, Centrusha Manufacturers Association, the Baker's Association, National Consumers Association, Fashion Council. I'm working with all these bodies, Mr. Speaker, and I really want to say thank you. My profound gratitude for the constructive engagements we've lost throughout the year in review. I'm indeed encouraged by the successes that we have recorded thus far, some of which I have mentioned earlier. I want to thank my people of Souffre for working together as we continue to transform Souffre Fonsha Jacques. I was told they had meetings there but no meetings can take back this ground. No meetings, no meetings in Fonsha Jacques can take back. No meetings can take back this ground. So, Mr. Speaker, we continue to build a more vibrant, competitive, and resilient commercial sector in St. Lucia. So, Mr. Speaker, I want to end, I want to thank the Almighty for his many graces and blessings as we continue to protect this beautiful country of ours. I thank you, Mr. Speaker.