ECLAC’s Executive Secretary participated in a regional conference organized by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Argentina and the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development of Germany, focused on the prospects for triangular cooperation in Latin America and the Caribbean. El Diálogo Virtual: Desafíos en la protección de las personas mayores y sus derechos frente a la pandemia por COVID-19 fue un espacio de reflexión e intercambio de experiencias regionales sobre sus impactos en la población mayor.

ECLAC’s Executive Secretary participated in a regional conference organized by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Argentina and the Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development of Germany, focused on the prospects for triangular cooperation in Latin America and the Caribbean.

ECLAC launched its Economic Survey of Latin America and the Caribbean 2020, an annual report in which it reaffirms that international cooperation, through better distribution of global liquidity, must underpin the expansion of policy space in the region.

The Inter-American Development Bank (IDB) approved a programmatic policy-based loan of $100 million to support the strengthening of Jamaica’s health systems to better prevent and manage the care of non-communicable diseases.

The main objective of this program is to contribute to the improvement of the health of Jamaica’s population by bolstering comprehensive policies for the reduction of Non-Communicable (Chronic) Diseases (NCDs) risk factors.  It also aims to improve access to an upgraded and integrated primary and secondary health network in prioritized areas, with an emphasis on chronic disease management. The idea is to provide more efficient and higher quality care.

Caribbean micro, small and medium-sized businesses, operated by youth and women, are preparing and building capacities to enable them to profit from international and intraregional trade in the aftermath of the pandemic.

The impact of the pandemic in the Caribbean has brought to light the urgency of moving away from training based on generic concepts, with a business planning and food processing-related focus, towards specialized, applied training, tailored to the current situation.

La máxima representante de la CEPAL intervino en la Sesión I: La recuperación económica post COVID-19 y el futuro del contrato social en las Américas, junto a Joseph E. Stiglitz, Premio Nobel de Economía y Profesor de la Universidad de Columbia; Carmen Reinhart, Vicepresidenta y Economista Jefe del Grupo del Banco Mundial; Rebeca Grynspan, Secretaria General Iberoamericana (SEGIB), y Paula Santilli, Directora Ejecutiva de PepsiCo Latinoamérica. El panel fue moderado por Luis Felipe López Calva, Director Regional para América Latina y el Caribe del Programa de las Naciones Unidas para el Desarrollo (PNUD).

These guidelines outline suggested actions to be considered to ensure health and safety while ensuring the continuation of education. In particular, the guidelines focus on preparations to meet the challenges of the new school year. The guidelines should help countries to identify their strengths and gaps in responses, survey the existing structures and processes in places that can be leveraged to fill gaps, and prioritise actions for the short and medium term.

Alicia Bárcena, the head of ECLAC, the UN body for the region – together with the Caribbean - who worked with Maya communities early in her career, is concerned by the health risks faced by indigenous people, as well as poverty in Latin America, which is rising, following years of progress.

“This conversation was an important opportunity to discuss how the Caribbean will build back better from the COVID-19 crisis. We heard about timely and comprehensive social protection interventions by the region’s governments – many with the support of the private sector – to address economic hardship and job losses, as well as initiatives to support families. At UN Women, we are committed to continuing to support the Governments and the people of the Caribbean in developing policies and programmes that address the needs of women, both in the private sector and in the informal sector, to ensure no one is left behind in the rebuilding of the region’s economies,” said Phumzile Mlambo-Ngcuka, Executive Director of UN Women.

The Caribbean Development Bank (CDB) and the Caribbean Disaster Emergency Management Agency (CDEMA) took delivery of the majority of US$3 million worth of PPE at the Port of Bridgetown. CDB procured and purchased the equipment with concessional resources through the Bank’s Special Development Fund.

Alicia Bárcena (warned) that the region is at risk of experiencing a true food crisis. She specified that more than 96 million people will be living in extreme poverty – 11.8% of all people living in cities and 29% of the residents in rural areas.

“This is a huge warning, the income of households is declining along with their access to the food basket. It is not that there is a shortage of food, it is that people do not have the resources to be able to acquire it. This comes on top of the low nutritional quality that people are experiencing, above all the poorest families,”.

New analysis from the World Economic Forum shows that some of Latin America’s and the Caribbean’s tourism strengths are less important than before to a competitive tourism economy during COVID-19. The onset and spread of the COVID-19 pandemic has shifted the factors that make a country’s travel and tourism sector competitive. Certain factors, such as healthcare capacity and digital travel offerings, are increasing in importance during the pandemic. Other factors, like international openness – a primary strength of Latin America – are now less important.

ECLAC’s Special Report COVID-19 No. 5, entitled Addressing the growing impact of COVID-19 with a view to reactivation with equality: new projections, indicates that since both external and domestic shocks have intensified, the region will experience a -9.1% fall in Gross Domestic Product (GDP) in 2020, with drops of -9.4% in South America, -8.4% in Central America and Mexico, and -7.9% in the Caribbean upon excluding Guyana, the strong growth of which prompts a smaller contraction in the subregional total (-5.4%).

Broader structural challenges must be addressed to build back better and transform the region’s development model.

Against the backdrop of pervasive inequality, accessible and comprehensive welfare systems must be developed, fair taxation systems created, decent jobs promoted, environmental sustainability strengthened, and social protection mechanisms reinforced, according to the UN chief. Moreover, regional economic integration is required, with “women participating fully and safely in public and economic life”, he stressed.

Alicia Bárcena explained that ECLAC is proposing five, very concrete recommendations: a debt relief initiative through a debt for climate change adaptation swap, which includes the creation of a resilience fund; a debt service standstill and a change in international financial institutions’ (IFIs) eligibility criteria for granting concessional funding; stage contingency bonds, especially with hurricane clauses; green and blue bonds; and liquidity support via the issuance of Special Drawing Rights (SDRs).

The report – Extreme Outlier: The Pandemic’s Unprecedented Shock to Tourism in Latin America and the Caribbean – launches a new global Tourism Dependency Index for countries, including 35 Latin American and Caribbean economies. It urges governments to take unprecedented measures to prevent the spread of the virus, and to support citizens and economies through this shock to the most tourism-dependent region in the world. 

Governments in nine Caribbean countries will still be able to maintain their disaster risk management efforts even with national finances stretched by the demands of responding to the COVID-19 pandemic.

This is because the Government of Canada has partnered with the Caribbean Development Bank to offer assistance through a new CAD$20 million fund - the Canada-CARICOM Climate Adaptation Fund (CCAF).

The contribution of USD$5.3 million will benefit a total of fifteen Caribbean countries including Trinidad and Tobago. Overall, the collaboration will support increased access to Personal Protective Equipment and other critical supplies to assist countries in their efforts to save lives and limit the human-to-human transmission of the COVID-19 Pandemic, focusing on populations experiencing marginalization or vulnerability, including health care workers.

The Pan American Health Organization/World Health Organization (PAHO/WHO) Office for Barbados and the Eastern Caribbean Countries (ECC) and USAID recently assisted the government of Antigua and Barbuda in their fight against COVID-19.

Additionally, as we enter the Hurricane season, the vehicle will also be able to support and respond to other health emergencies and support disease surveillance activities of any new or existing health challenges.

Within the region, the Caribbean economies are suffering even more due to their high dependence on one of the most dramatically impacted sectors—tourism—which, for some, accounts for 50 to 90 percent of GDP and employment.

Given the scale of the crisis and unprecedented uncertainty, governments have had to also deploy fiscal measures to strengthen the health system, protect the most vulnerable and support employment and otherwise viable businesses.