The government of Dominica engaged in a high level dialogue with the United Nations Sub-Regional Team for Barbados and the Eastern Caribbean, to provide a road map for a more upscaled partnership and better tailored support to meet the priority needs of the government and people of Dominica.
The Dominica delegation was headed by the Prime Minister Roosevelt Skerrit, and included members of cabinet and senior public officers, while the UN Team led by UN Resident Coordinator, Didier Trebucq, included the heads of UN agencies, funds and programmes.
The virtual talks sought to affirm, at the highest level, the UN’s commitment to strengthening cooperation with Dominica. This includes identifying key priorities or gaps to be addressed, based on national strategies and development challenges, opportunities for advancing progress on implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and establishment of a joint national steering committee to provide oversight for effective programme implementation, monitoring and reporting.
Describing the meeting as a right step in strengthening Dominica’s relationship with the UN, Prime Minister Skerrit welcomed the efforts by the UN Development System to streamline its support and improve administrative coordination towards Dominica’s national agenda. “Over the years, the UN has been a trusted and reliable partner to the government of Dominica. In the last few years, particularly post Hurricane Maria, Dominica’s engagement with the UN has intensified with support from more agencies within the UN system, for social protection programmes, disaster risk reduction and recovery, climate resilience strategy, and economic development,” he noted.
UN Resident Coordinator, Mr. Didier Trebucq, underscored the UN’s continued commitment to responding to Dominica’s unique needs, operationalised through a new Dominica-UN Implementation Plan to provide the country with a more integrated support from the UN system, and enhanced by the presence of an in- country UN Coordination Officer. “As part of our ongoing UN Reform efforts, we have been increasing our diverse support for SIDS and particularly to address their vulnerabilities as a result of COVID-19. It is about bringing a distinctive upscaled offer that better tailors our policy and technical support to each country in alignment with national needs and regional priorities,” he underlined.
