Senior Officials of Caribbean Employers’ Organizations to attend ILO’s CAMEO IV in Antigua and Barbuda

Workshop will focus on strategic issues of management and leadership.

News | 22 August 2013
PORT OF SPAIN (ILO News) - Leaders of Employers’ Organizations from 19 International Labour Organization (ILO) Caribbean Member States and non-metropolitan territories will attend the 4th Caribbean Academy for Management of Employers’ Organizations (CAMEO), which will convene at the Halcyon Cove Hotel, Dickenson Bay, Antigua and Barbuda from 26-28 August 2013. The Meeting will focus on strategic issues of management and leadership under the theme: “Analyzing and Shaping the Business Environment to Influence Policy Development”.

CAMEO is being organized by the ILO’s Decent Work Team and Office for the Caribbean based in Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, (DWT/O-POS) in collaboration with the Antigua and Barbuda Employers’ Federation (ABEF).

The Permanent Secretary, Ministry of National Security and Labour, Antigua and Barbuda, Ms. Sharon Peters, will address the Opening Ceremony of the Meeting, along with the President of the ABEF, Mr. Acres Stowe, the Director, DWT/O-POS, Dr. Giovanni di Cola and the Secretary General of the International Organization of Employers, Mr. Brent Wilton. The Director, ILO’s Bureau for Employers’ Activities (ACT/EMP), Ms Deborah France-Massin will also attend the Meeting.

The Meeting will provide a forum for senior officials of employers’ organizations to:

  • identify priorities of national and regional Caribbean Employers’ Organizations;
  • build on their management knowledge and assess their effectiveness in influencing others in support of business positions;
  • gain a better understanding of the wider international and regional environment (economic, social and political) in which they operate; and
  • discuss lessons learned from national initiatives that can be applied at a regional level.
Presentations at the three-day Meeting will focus on identifying strategies for supporting and representing business; influencing policy development at national and regional levels; operating within the Caribbean Single Market and Economy framework; and developing an enabling environment for sustainable enterprises.

“Given the continuing focus on the Caribbean Single Market with the pivotal requirements of free movement of capital, goods, services and labour, it is imperative that representative employers’ organizations strengthen the channels of communication amongst them,” says Dr. Giovanni di Cola, Director of the DWT/O-POS, adding that “a collaborative approach to developing policy positions will best support viable and sustainable enterprises throughout the region”.

CAMEO was launched in 2007 and is a collaborative programme between the ILO and business institutions of higher learning created to support executives of employers’ organizations in the English- and Dutch-speaking Caribbean.

The ILO is a specialized agency within the United Nations system committed to advancing opportunities for women and men to obtain decent and productive work in conditions of freedom, equity, security and human dignity.