Presentation of outcomes to the plenary

Global Supply Chain Forum 2024 concludes with strategic roadmap for enhancing SIDS resilience

The Global Supply Chain Forum 2024, hosted by UNCTAD and the government of Barbados, concluded with significant outcomes and a clear pathway for future work on global supply chains. The forum, which attracted over 1,200 participants, far exceeding the expected 300, served as a vital platform for high-level discussions on the multifaceted challenges faced by Small Island Developing States (SIDS) in the context of global supply chains, particularly in light of the disruptions caused by the COVID-19 pandemic.

A key outcome of the forum was the endorsement of the ministerial statement titled “Enhancing Transport and Logistics in Small Island Developing States.” This statement, which highlights the unique challenges SIDS encounter and proposes actionable solutions to boost efficiency, sustainability, and resilience, is set to be presented at the fourth International Conference on Small Island Developing States in Antigua, demonstrating the forum’s influence on future policy discussions.

Throughout the event, speakers underscored the importance of political will and public-private partnerships as essential drivers for implementing effective trade facilitation reforms. The role of technology and digitalisation in enhancing supply chain resilience was also emphasised, with discussions on the need for a global regulatory framework for net-zero shipping and the equitable transition to sustainable maritime fuels.

The forum celebrated a balanced gender representation among speakers and participants, reflecting a commitment to inclusivity. Additionally, the human-centric approach to policy-making was highlighted as a vital consideration in developing sustainable and resilient transport solutions.

The event also served as a precursor to the next Global Supply Chain Forum, scheduled for 2026 in Saudi Arabia. Participants were encouraged to provide feedback and suggestions to help shape the future forum, ensuring that the momentum gained in Barbados continues to drive progress in addressing global supply chain issues.

Noteworthy observations from the forum included the recognition of the new normal of supply chain disruptions and the necessity for reevaluating commercial risk allocation to ensure that the system continues to serve communities effectively. The discussions also touched on the need for regional cooperation and the development of regional supply chains as a strategy to mitigate geopolitical risks and enhance the resilience of SIDS.

In conclusion, the Global Supply Chain Forum 2024 marked a pivotal step towards fostering collaboration and formulating actionable solutions for the challenges facing global supply chains. The forum’s outcomes are expected to influence future policies and actions aimed at creating more resilient and sustainable supply chains globally, with a particular focus on the needs and vulnerabilities of SIDS. The commitment to continue building on the progress made at the forum reflects the collective determination to address these critical issues through multilateralism and international cooperation.

Belle Holder:
Welcome back from the break, ladies and gentlemen. We will continue now with the presentation of outcomes to the plenary. And the Global Supply Chain Forum 2024 was organized by UNCTAD and the government of Barbados. We’re going to focus now on key insights, best practices and outcomes. The session will be moderated once again by Shamika Sirimanne, and she’s joined on stage now, ladies and gentlemen, by the team from UNCTAD, Frida Youssef, Jaime Mendoza, Mark Assaf, Poul Hansen , Regina Astoriotis, and Jan Hoffman. Mr. Sirimanne, the floor is yours.

Shamika N. Sirimanne:
Thank you so much, Bel. I don’t know how you do it. You do it so well, from the beginning to the last session today. So now we are at the end. And this is a very happy moment for us, because it has been an extremely successful forum for us. And it is also a sad moment for us, and we are leaving our friends and partners, and then we go our own ways. So let me say that when the Prime Minister said that she would want UNCTAD to do a supply chain seminar, that’s what she said. She said she wants us to come to Barbados and do a supply chain seminar, because the supply chain issues were so dire at that time of COVID-19, when we had our UNCTAD 15. And from a seminar, we have gone to a global forum, and the intention, the objective was to have 300 people come in here. Let me tell you, we had 1,200 participants at this forum, and over 900 of them were here from across the world, and we have 207 speakers, and 85 women and 122 men, not a bad gender balance there, it’s much better than the 7.5% of seafarers who are women, and we had 12 heads and deputies of international organizations, we have 15 ministers, and we have the private sector here, the academia here, all the stakeholders here, the chambers of commerce, and remember that the story was about, to talk about supply chain inclusivity, sustainability, and resilience. So what we are going to do, this session will happen in two parts, first my colleagues will try to summarize this amazing and insightful conversations you had, it is not complete, but they just put something together to show to you the key points, and then we will, Jan will explain to us where we meet next, and Jan normally has only three points, so that’s easy, and then we will, who’s laughing, no but that’s true, Jan always says I have three points, and he sticks to three points, and I’m so happy when Jan says that, and then we will have the closing ceremony, we have our secretary general, and we have the foreign minister here, so that’s what we are going to do, and then we will be very happy to leave, very sad to leave all of you, and then go on different directions. So let me start bringing my colleague Frida Youssef.

Frida Youssef:
Thank you Shamika, and good afternoon to all of you, actually we were given this, first it’s a pleasure to be here, I had the chance to speak. with some of you. We were given this very challenging task to summarize everything we have been going through over the past three, four days in four minutes. And I have been working in eight, nine sessions, following also some other co-organizing sessions. So I will try to limit it to four minutes, but Shamika, please, you can stop me if I go beyond, because I know I can go beyond the limits. So the first points I would like to bring is really the high-level session, yeah, high-level opening session. The two main points that really strike me, and I would like to reiterate that this is a really important takeaway message that we have to remember. The first one is coming from the Prime Minister, Mia Mottley, on the uniformity of international policies, where she said that SIDs are negatively impacted by the one-size-fit-all approach of the international community, which often overlook the specificities of vulnerabilities. And the second point that I would like also to bring to your attention is you, Minister Kerrie Symmonds, when you mentioned that we need to have a human-centric policy approach to advocate for a more sustainable and resilient transport. And this should start from the human level. We have to work bottom-up approach and find effective solutions. So this is very important, this human-centric approach that we have to bear in mind, which we sometimes tend to forget. And then we’ll move to the second important point that was, or issues that were discussed during the session on geography of trade and maritime logistics, and that is the trade and supply chain vulnerabilities. So today the world is still deeply interconnected, but however, global trade patterns are reconfiguring, and this is aligned with the geopolitical lines. So, there are more shifts that are likely to happen, and businesses need to be aware of these potential trade-offs, of the different paths ahead. Two important points here one should take into consideration is diversification or fragmentation of the supply chain balance in the face of geopolitical risks, which approach to take when it comes to mitigating the risk of geopolitical risks, looking at these two different approaches. The other important point that emerged also from this discussion during the session was that, of course, reiterating that trade is a matter of survival of seeds. So, the seeds are highly sensitive to disruption, and the impact they face is much higher compared to any other countries or group of countries, specifically when it comes to transport costs and its implication on food and energy. The other important point also that came up is that we need to have, in order to improve the resilience of the sector, it’s very important to look into how we can make those risks and opportunities. There are gaps, and when you have gaps you have opportunities. So how to overcome these risks, and for that you need to have very robust policies to manage the high level of market volatility uncertainty. In addition to this very important, robust policy and framework, the level of coordination is very important. The level of coordination along the supply chain, and as well as among countries, the seeds. And this is, I will bring back this, because really this issue, the focus of regional cooperation, has been reiterated throughout the discussion over different sessions. Oh no, I’m still in the first part, okay, sorry. Okay, another important point I would say, near-shoring of global value chain. This is also something that came up, but just to also bring to it, I mean, because this is an important, near-shoring was viewed, when we were discussing, as a nuanced opportunity for the Caribbean region, particularly in the ancillary services. It doesn’t have the same impact in countries like Mexico, where they have a very well-established manufacturing ecosystem. I’ll go fast. Maritime and logistics. Again, the sector was affected by, I mean, the seeds were affected by the consolidation, you know, of the shipping lines, fewer shipping lines and larger vessels. And what is important here is really to be able to diversify trade and logistics. And to diversify trade and logistics is not only to encounter geopolitical risks, but also to be able to build the resilience of the sector that will enable more flexibility and stability, you know, for the seeds, by diversifying trade and logistics. Now comes the issue of, another very important point that came up, was this issue of having a regional logistic and investment strategy for the Caribbean. And because, you know, seeds, small countries, cannot work in isolation. They have to coordinate and combine effort to really come up with a regional strategy, building on the strengths and competitive advantage of every island, and try to build a regional approach, a regional value chain, and region transport systems. Okay, I spoke about collaborative approach. Decarbonization. I have to read this one paragraph. IMO should develop a global regulatory framework that enables a pathway to net zero shipping. By closing the price gap between conventional and near-zero-carbon maritime fuel, and ensuring that the transition is just and equitable, and this is very important, you know, no one should be left behind, SIDS and also the people. In particular, by avoiding supply chain disruption and price increase for those most vulnerable, while also stepping up for training the workforce, the seafarer, and cooperation along the supply chain, training, and the force. Technology is very important, building the resilience of the sector is very important, you need to, but there would be synergies between sustainability and resilience, there are some trade-offs, and in the case of the SIDS, the trade-off can be quite high because of the vulnerabilities of the SIDS. I think I’m going to stop here, but just to remember that there are some enabling factors, digitalization, technology, capacity building, partnership, collaboration, finance, and the force, and we’re here, very happy to collaborate with all of you, thank you very much.

Shamika N. Sirimanne:
Thank you Frida, I told you I knew if I unleashed my experts on you, they are so passionate about their subject, it will be very difficult to get them to say everything they want in four minutes, and I knew this would happen. But let me also tell you all the outcomes are being written up now, and when we go back and we will post all the key outcomes of all the sessions, and you also have seen some AI summaries, and they are not, you know, they are AI, they don’t have human intervention, so some of them are a bit crazy, but we will go back and we will look into that and we will build all the insight that you shared with us here, so you don’t need to say everything. So let me now, after saying all that, saying it’s only four minutes, I give the floor to my colleague Jaime from ASICUDA, I think you know, many of you know him here.

Jaime Mendoza:
Hello, good morning to all. And Shamika, I promise I won’t go beyond. So I’m very happy to be here standing in this room after 20 years when I started my journey in the Caribbean. So I think all of us who are here for some reason or another are trying to find solutions to transportation disruptions and what happened with our health crisis that we have seen. And that has impacted significantly the way we conduct trade. And this has driven the cutting edge technology solutions to take a very important pivotal role. The conference has offered and the sessions that we were able to go through across the board have touched on digital solutions, automation, digitalization, and provide services centric to government, to some extent, centric to the private sector as well. So we have seen that exploring pragmatic solutions that streamline the processes, this can reshape the global commerce. Various sessions, the practitioners’ experience was immense and we had seen how implementing single windows for trade, port community solutions have significantly enhanced connectivity and provided a much more integrated environment with those partners, with those stakeholders that need to have this interoperability, the data exchange capabilities for advancing technology. There are some key considerations that have been shared through the sessions and enhancing connectivity and accessibility, key. That was paramount. Single window has been repeated all over. the place for trade, for maritime solutions, for port operations as well. We have seen that our recent publication, the roadmap for building single window solutions and WCO’s compendium also can be a good source of information for those countries who are starting that journey. And we know that those have completed and have engaged on a new iteration will also be able to benefit from those. We have seen also that the digital ecosystem needs to grow, needs to provide better options for SMEs, needs to provide also other solutions to facilitate e-commerce, which is constantly and exponentially growing for the handling of express and postal that customs has the burden to see and to try to expedite as much as possible along with the port and airport authorities. Strengthening digital corridors is also important. That means connecting the dots. We have a lot of solutions disconnected and we need to make sure that they all integrate. We have seen what Barbados port has been doing, what other countries in the region, other small island development states like Jamaica, Vanuatu, and they have been successful. So we need to go on that and ensure that they can apply advanced technology. Blockchain, artificial intelligence is not the future, it’s the present. So we need to make sure that we can, as part of our secure as well to ensure that we’re there, that we’re providing all this technology that will allow countries to benefit and ensure that they have the economic growth that they deserve. We had an exciting site visit to the port and that was very good to see that even with small ports as Bridgetown Port compared to other larger in the developed states, you can implement innovative strategies. So that has been very important. That simplifying requirements, integrating solutions will surely bring us to releasing, to reducing the release times and costs that are associated in international trade. And the last point is the importance of political will. How important and relevant, decisive is to have political will, sponsorship, and support to ensure that these initiatives are successful. So we want to thank everybody for their participation and we want to make sure that technology continues to be adopted. Don’t be a laggard, be an innovator, be up front. Thank you very much.

Shamika N. Sirimanne:
Thank you, Jaime, well said, and I think we also heard the leadership was a big issue. We can bring all the technologies in the world, but if there’s no political will to adopt them, adopt them, we will not go anywhere. Thank you so much. So let me now invite Mark Assaf, the Chief of Trade for Trade. Mark, you have four minutes. I feel like some sort of school teacher, four minutes.

Mark Assaf:
All protocol observes, allow me to start immediately. And actually we start with the COVID-19 because this pandemic was dramatic and actually underlined the importance and the crucial role played by ports around the world in the international trade and global supply chain. So, we know resilience is actually inherent of ports that are especially located on maritime crossroads. They’re capable of managing crisis, and sometimes a crisis in one side of the world could be an opportunity in another one. So they’ve demonstrated this type of ability. I’m summarizing you the two sessions where I participate related on port management efficiency and the World Port Sustainable Programme. For some island countries that were represented with us in the four days, the closure of ports equals to the closure of the island. So this is a strong and powerful message that came from our beneficiaries. Also some research from Latin America and the Caribbean revealed that port capacity building has changed dramatically in the last 20 years. You cannot manage your ports the way you did a few years down the road. And this will change and evolve more and more. So you need, there’s really a pressing need to equip your port leaders with analytical skills so that they can embrace digitalization. They know what to do with this wealth of data, because it’s good to have big data, but what do you do with it, right? And to develop a forward-looking vision. You really need the long-term vision in here. So that was one other strong message. Port solution initiatives as a maritime or port-single-window system begin with the capacity to design clear strategies. And Barbados Port Incorporated, that is also one of our hosts here, exemplify that and the importance of bringing internal solutions to this equation. Similarly, members of the Inter-American Committee on Ports that were present, the representatives, have also shown a strong commitment to resilience and disaster risk management by leveraging technology. So, they have taken on board in the last three years now a lot of initiatives in that field. The Inter-American Development Bank, to come to the financial part that was mentioned by our Secretary General in UNCTAD, is also of crucial importance. They advocate really for greater private sector involvement, the PPPs, because without that money nothing will happen. So to adopt also, they have a study to show the landlord model, port model, is the one to go because they bring more efficiency. The port industry is highly concentrated, with the top ten terminals operating and controlling 70% of the market. Small island developing states in the Pacific face similar challenges, particularly from climate change, where it’s already very difficult for them to be profitable, let alone be competitive, and then they have this reduced bargaining power for smaller ports. Landlocked countries, examples where they are present too, like Bolivia, taking advantage of the supply chain and also trying to reduce transport costs using the rivers and maximizing resources. In terms of the World Port Sustainable Programme, the Port Endeavour Games also try to highlight the need to make this effort of financing and building solutions that are digital and green jointly, and also demonstrating that this is not the panacea of big ports. A lot of smaller ports can do it and have managed to do that. It’s also in one of the programmes and representatives from ports in Africa, French-speaking ones, so they’ve made the effort to try to follow the session here in English. They’ve also highlighted the need for this capacity building, and also what was mentioned in the previous session, trying to promote more and more women into leading roles. And that is really covering SDG 5, and also this partnership under SDG 17. Very, very important with this South-South cooperation, and I believe there was a lot of documents, MOUs signed between, for instance, Barbados and other ports in Africa. So I will finish by telling you that these networks that we’re building, this community of people working around global supply chains, is the way for us we see the future, and probably we will see also more women leaders that will be there in two years with us. So I will stop here, and five minutes, thank you.

Shamika N. Sirimanne:
Thank you, thank you Mark, and I also want to acknowledge that you have done a lot to bring women into the fold in your port management programme, and that’s a good practice for us, as also SG mentioned in the last session. So let me now invite Poul Hanson, who is the Lead of Trade Facilitation in UN Trade and Development.

Poul Hansen :
Thank you very much, and good morning to everyone. I will try and summarise the track that we have had on trade facilitation committees. When I look out here in the meeting room, I see some faces that were not in that track and in the sessions. That was a mistake, I can tell you. But we will have other trade facilitation forums, and next time you can join. I will try and summarise what we discussed. National trade facilitation committees have been codified with the WTO Trade Facilitation Agreement. However, some international organisations like UNCTAD have worked on this concept for many years, and this week’s forum was actually our third successful NTFC forum, with 12 sessions. This was focused on sharing good practices and implementation of trade facilitation reforms, on the role of customs in trade facilitation, border agency coordination, and we have shared information, tools, and solutions that make national trade facilitation committees work more efficiently. But importantly, we also see that there are more and more issues that are being addressed in the committees that are not necessarily core national trade facilitation committee issues. These are what we call popularly NTFC plus. These are issues such as, for instance, supply chain disruptions, where NTFCs, national trade facilitation committees, are natural points for discussion because these committees gather all the relevant stakeholders. We see that issues such as humanitarian relief is being discussed in national trade facilitation committees in order for countries to be better prepared for disasters. We see the forum has also shared country cases and best practices on how national committees can be involved in resources mobilization, something that is obviously important when you implement trade facilitation reforms. But it is not always really the competency of the members of the committee, so additional capacity building is necessary in these areas. And then finally, a number of emerging issues have also been discussed passionately, such as inclusivity, gender mainstreaming, such as green and climate smart trade facilitation, again, policies that were not originally on the agenda of these committees and where probably additional skills are needed for national committees. And therefore, one of the conclusions of our meetings this week is that NTFCs need to continuously adapt, acquire new skills, and include partners, new partners. Overarching, the forum has largely agreed that coordination and digitalization are key drivers to achieving trade facilitation reforms, both at national level and at the global level. and at regional levels such as in the Caribbean. And a final important consideration of the form is that real trade facilitation reforms will only happen in the framework of a public-private partnership, something that Minister Cummins has stressed several times in her interventions in this week. Ultimately, in line with one of the recommendations of the Bridgetown Covenant of UNCTAD 15, the work of national trade facilitation committees should contribute to a reduction of transaction costs, and I also wish now to add a reduction in environmental impact of international cross-border trade. This forum of NTFCs that is incorporated in the global forum has been successful, not least because we are working with partners as we have done in the past. And the real positive outcome of the forum has been the discussion and the exchanges you have had. Many partnerships have been established. We from UNCTAD have signed a partnership agreement with the China Council on Promotion of International Trade. So the forum is really contributing to the creation of a trade facilitation practitioners’ partnership, and something that UNCTAD will continue to support. So ending my summary here, thank you for your active engagement. We look forward to see you again at the next forum. And for those of you that move on to Antigua, please do not forget trade facilitation.

Shamika N. Sirimanne:
Thank you so much, Poul. I think it was the two days’ conversations that you summarized, and they were extremely insightful conversations, and we will continue. Regina, please.

Regina Asariotis:
Ladies and gentlemen, it’s a privilege to be asked to share some impressions with you. Of course, as you know, we will publish a fuller summary of key points and recommendations in due course, and you will have also seen the AI-generated initial summary. I would like to start maybe with recalling the Prime Minister of Barbados, Mia Motlley, called for this forum to help address some of the particular challenges that are affecting small island developing states at the end of the UNCTAD 15 conference. And one of these major, major challenges is, of course, climate change. And climate change poses different types of challenges, of course, but for the small island developing states, again, as Prime Minister Motlley said in her introductory speech, ports and airports are air bridges and sea bridges. So climate change and the impacts that it can have can be devastating for all sectors of the economy. So transportation is not just an industrial sector in its own right. It underpins everything we do. And this is no more evident than in the small island developing nations. So it was a privilege to organize three sessions that were dealing with climate change adaptation, resilience building, and DRR for ports. We had very good speakers who drew out a lot of issues. It’s a topic which I’m pleased to say we, as UNCTAD, have been working on since 2008 in collaboration with many stakeholders, multidisciplinary, which is very important. And the outcome of that session, not surprising, was to recall how critical the physical transport infrastructure network and its integrity is to global trade for all countries, including the landlocked countries that need access to global markets, but particularly the SIDS that depend on it for all purposes, including in the context of disaster risk recovery and response. We had the head of SEDIMA and the head of the Port Managers Association of the Caribbean as part of the panel who were highlighting some specific measures that would be useful as best practices in the future. So that was a very interesting set of sessions. We’re very happy it was among the few sessions that were streamed, so there is a record of this, and we were able to invite other stakeholders who had participated in our other work, including in Barbados in the past and project work from the Caribbean to participate in that session. So that was a very satisfying element. I would say the main message from that set of sessions was there is no time to lose. The planning horizons for maritime transfer infrastructure are such that you have to start planning early to be ready when impacts hit, and in the absence of action, the cost of inaction is just unfathomable, actually, and uninsurable. So the main message from that set of sessions was there was a greater need for collaboration and action, not talking. So this type of issue should not be an afterthought, but become much more mainstream. I had also the pleasure – we weren’t able, of course, to be everywhere – but I also had the pleasure to participate in two other sessions. One dealt with the energy transition in the fishing sector, and that was a very interesting session highlighting the importance of the fishing sector for Barbados and for other small island states, both on the economic side, but also biodiversity, and the need for just transition. I commend to you the summary of that session that you will find in in the outcome document. And one dealt with a very key point, and that is the new normal, the supply chain disruptions that we face. And we know they can be geopolitical, they can be COVID, they can be climate related, but it is the new normal. And there was one session organized by FIATA, the International Freight Forwards Association, bringing together all the shippers associations and the World Shipping Council representing the liner companies, which highlighted the need for reassessing the terms that are applied, the internal commercial risk allocation to ensure that the system keeps serving who we hope it serves, namely the community and particularly the vast majority of small and medium sized shippers companies across the world and in the developing nations particularly. So there I will leave it. Thank you very much. We are all thrilled that you have come and that you are so interested in this. Thank you.

Shamika N. Sirimanne:
Thank you so much, Regina, for bringing the work that we have been doing on port resilience. This is a very, very important point. As you said, there’s no time to lose on this one. These are critical infrastructures and they are increasingly exposed to climate change induced disasters. Very, very important point. Jan, I give you the floor from here to next, from here to 2026.

Jan Hoffman:
Yeah, thank you, Shamika. Thank you all. You forecasted correctly, three points. No, first, really, thank you. We were all forced to make choices to go to one parallel track or another. So that’s why we had thought it would be good to make some attempt to share what happened in some of the other sessions. It is still not complete because even we could not participate in every session. So as Famika said, there will be a comprehensive report, but I hope you found this. It’s useful to see the leaders of the different streams, the topics, behind them are many others who are in the room, there are others who worked, Lisanne, Pamela, Maria, the whole team so a huge personal thank you also to the Barbados team on this report. Second point, the way to 2026, the way to our next global supply chain forum in Saudi Arabia, I’m afraid the challenges we were discussing are not going to go away. Is it good? Is it bad for our areas of work? We could say we are happy to see that finally the things we have been preaching for decades, how important it is to have efficient supply chains, people realized when a ship gets stuck in Suez and we have COVID, when we have the Red Sea, the Black Sea, the Panama Gulf, yes, and I’m afraid we will have more challenges and opportunities with technology, energy transition, climate, trade wars, and a lot of other challenging things, so I’m, I think the agenda, the scope of issues will not decrease between now and 2026. Third and last time, working together towards the next forum, the timing is likely to be similar to here, mid-end of May. We want to make sure that we don’t have other conflicting events in Leipzig or in Miami, so we will try and plan well to have this. What I’ve perceived here by having created this forum, we have seen, I’m confident we have had interactions between Pacific island states and friends and members and the Caribbean between people working in the IMO and people more working in COP and the private sector and the public sector, so that’s the idea, to create a forum where we work together on these different issues. That’s on the substance. The idea is, and I think we can say we have achieved it, at UN Trade and Development we already have a very successful series of world investment forums. We have a very successful series of e-weeks, e-commerce week, and I’m now confident we have a third major series, which is the GSCF. I’m not sure if the name is as sexy as the other two, but it’s, I don’t know. We call it always the Barbados Forum, which somehow that’s a challenge. Very last point, you will please help us preparing. You have all about half an hour received an email with a little link for a survey. With some yes, no, and whatever answers, but there’s also a free space which you can freely use to send us your thoughts, suggestions, input for the next one. I hope to see you all in 2026 in Riyadh. Thank you very much.

Shamika N. Sirimanne:
Thank you so much, Jan. So now we come to the closing part of the session. So I think we can move out. Smile and Carlos and Jan, I don’t know how many meetings you two have been having for the last six months, and it’s so good to see you smiling and also Jan smiling.

Belle Holder:
Once again, ladies and gentlemen, the team from UNCTAD, Frida Youssef, Jaime Mendoza, Mark Asaff, Poul Hanson, Regina Asariotis, Jan Hoffman, and Shamika Sirimanne. And now, ladies and gentlemen, we will hear directly from Her Excellency, the Secretary General of UNCTAD, Ms. Rebeca Grynspan.

Rebeca Grynspan:
Dear Kerrie Symmonds, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade of Barbados, dear Minister, thank you for being with us. You have been great and, you know, you have made this really what it was. And the same to the ministers and the authorities that are here with us, the distinguished delegates, ladies and gentlemen, dear friends. It is my bittersweet duty to close this first Global Supply Chain Forum, bitter because we have to leave Barbados and we have to leave all of you and this forum that has been such a resounding success, an affirmation that we are on the right track to forge a resilient and sustainable future for global supply chains. But it is also sweet because it signifies the beginning of a journey, not the end. The past few days have been a testament of the power of collaboration, the importance of innovation and the unwavering commitment of all stakeholders to build a better future for our global supply chains. We have heard inspiring stories of resilience and determination. We have witnessed the power of partnerships to drive change and we have seen firsthand the potential of technology to transform the way we do business. From the insightful discussions on climate change adaptation and resilience building in our ports to the exploration of inclusive trade facilitation and the role of national trade facilitation committees, we have delved into the critical issues that are shaping the future of our supply chains. The supply chain innovation challenge, with its groundbreaking ideas, has demonstrated the immense creativity and ingenuity that exists within our community. And we heard today the announcement that Barbados will do that as well. It is a reminder that even the most complex challenges can be overcome with the right mindset and approach. And the gender panel, that was so inspiring, wasn’t it? Today we are not merely celebrating the culmination of this forum, we are laying the groundwork for the future, the outcome and contributions we have produced here. We heard the ANCA team, the SEADS Transport Ministerial Statement, the insightful discussions and recommendations from our various sessions, and the innovative solutions presented in the Supply Chain Innovation Challenge will all play a key role in shaping the agendas of upcoming global events. These outcomes will be instrumental as we head into the SEADS Forum. We are going from here to Antigua. The conference will be held next week. They will also contribute to the LLDCs, the Landlocked Developing Countries Conference, the Summit of the Future in September, the UN Oceans Conference 2025, and CAT16, our conference in 2025, in our 60th anniversary this year, the COP in Azerbaijan of the UN CCC process, the UN Disaster Risk Reduction and Climate Action Conference, and the WTO Trade Facilitation Agreement Implementation Process. So we have to make this happen in all of these different forums, so very important. So let’s ensure that the momentum we have built here continues to propel us forward as we strive to build a more sustainable and resilient global economy. supply chain ecosystem. But the main purpose of my closing remarks today is to say thank you. Thanks first of all to the government of Barbados, and especially to the Prime Minister Motlley and the Foreign Minister. Thank you very much. I want also to thank you, Minister Chapman and Minister Cummins, and all the ministers that have been here with us, the Minister of Labour and others, for being here and making this so special. I also want to thank Ambassador Matthew Wilson. Matthew, where are you? And as was said before, our counterparts, working counterparts, Carlos Wharton and his team, with Deidre and Jacqueline, Deidre and Jacqueline, thank you. They have been so keen making this forum a reality, just as they were in making UNCTAD 15 a reality almost three years ago. But let me also specially thank from Barbados, Alice Jordan. Alice is not here with us, but she has been an angel for all of us. She has been looking into all the details of our stay in Barbados, making it really a wonderful experience. Alice, wherever you are, thank you so much. I also want to thank every one of you here today. To our delegates, the high-level participants who have come here from all corners of the world, from all walks of life, and from all of the possible links of our global value chain. I especially want to thank our panellists for sharing their precious time and knowledge. Your insights are invaluable, and I know they have already inspired and challenged. all of us in the audience, so thank you again. But especially I want to thank you, the ministers and authorities that are here with us. I was in government. I know how difficult it is to leave your country, to go to the conferences. Your really contribution have been invaluable to us. So really thank you so much to all of you. And I also want to thank my own team, Shamika and Yan, thank you so much. Can all the UNCTAD people here stand up? There are many. Thank you so much. And especially thank you Pamela and Maria. These two women have been amazing. They have responded to all your messages and requests day and night, seven days a week during the many months of preparation. So the whole UNCTAD team have really powered through an insane amount of work to get the forum ready, to make it worthy of your attendance. And their tireless dedication and commitment have made this a resounding success. I am very proud of my organization and my team. I want especially also to thank my colleagues from the UN and the international organizations. ILO, IMO, UNIDO, Global Compact, you know, and all the rest. You have been fantastic in being with us all this time. Thank you so much. And with this forum, we and UN Trade and Development hope to have carried forward a key mandate from Bridgetown. on the Bridgetown Covenant three years ago. More than just complying with a mandate, I feel that we together have surpassed expectations and we have set a way forward to bring back trust and hope to our global international community. We need that. We need trust and we need hope because multilateralism is today more important than ever. Thank you.

Belle Holder:
May we have another round of applause please for her Excellency? Secretary General, Grynspan, for her tireless work. I don’t know if anyone noticed. She normally wears an owl brooch. She’s not wearing it today, but she’s been wearing it for many years and I finally got the opportunity to say, Her Excellency, what is the significance of this owl brooch that you wear all the time? And she said, it wasn’t a gift. I bought it. I saw it. I liked it. And then I realized that an owl is wise and he does a lot more listening than talking. And that’s, it became, it has become her signature, wise owl. Ladies and gentlemen, on day one of the Global Supply Chain Forum, there was a ministerial dialogue that was held. And the objective of the high level dialogue was to engage in a constructive and forward-looking dialogue to address the unique transport and logistical challenges faced by SIDS, fostering collaboration and formulating practical, actionable solutions to boost efficiency, sustainability, and resilience. The session was endorsed by a ministerial statement entitled, Enhancing Transport and Logistics in Small Island Developing States, and that statement will be presented at the fourth International Conference on Small Island Developing States, scheduled for May 27th to 30th in Antigua, just a few days from now. And so ladies and gentlemen, I’m going to take this time to acknowledge the important outcome of the SIDS ministerial session, and it reflects a guiding framework and sets out the priorities for achieving a more sustainable and resilient transport and logistics sector for SIDS. Ladies and gentlemen, I call to the stage now, Minister of Transport and Urban Planning from Curacao, Charles Cooper. Please join us. I also acknowledge Minister for Transport from Seashells, Antony Derjacques. Minister of Transportation, Communication and Information Technology from the Marshall Islands, Hilton Kendall. Minister of Transport, Energy, Communication and Innovation from Tuvalu, Simon Kofe. And ladies and gentlemen, it is my distinct pleasure to welcome from Barbados, our Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, the Honourable Kerrie Symmonds. I also want to acknowledge two ministers who unfortunately had to leave us early from Guyana, Juan Juan Edghill, the Minister of Public Works in Guyana, and also from Martinique, that would be Sandra Casanova. They had to leave us early, but I wanted to take this opportunity to acknowledge the work of our ministers. Ladies and gentlemen, the ministerial declaration was signed. endorsed by the gentleman you see standing before you. We need big smiles for this one gentlemen, big smiles. And now ladies and gentlemen can we have Ambassador Matthew Wilson please join the photo as well as Secretary General Grynspan please. Ladies and gentlemen this is one one of the many important outcomes of the Global Supply Chain Forum for 2024. Thank you. I will now hand over the podium to Minister Symmonds.

Kerrie Symmonds:
Thank you so much Bill. Ladies and gentlemen where do I begin? This has been I think it is safe to say is surprising but I think overwhelming success. I want to begin perhaps by reflecting I think it was on Jaime Mendoza’s observation that this effort if it is to be what we hope it to be will require there to be a lot of political will. Madam Secretary General, I give you the assurance of Barbados’ unswerving and unstinting political will. We feel that there was a duty that we needed to speak to the world, and I think perhaps lift the gaze and address the conscience of the globe on this critical issue of global supply chains. And sometimes, as I said at the very first intervention I made here, it is tempting to get very academic because it is an issue that attracts the attention of the professors at university. But it is equally an issue that impacts every household and every housewife who has a few kids to feed. And the reality is that nobody goes into business for that business to fail. So private enterprise is equally impacted, and we get it. Politically, it is impossible to govern a small state without understanding where the pain is and trying in some way to respond. When you listen to the critics, you will sometimes feel that we who are saddled with that title called politician are insensitive to any form of pain, but the reality is that we do get it. And the truth is that on small island states like ours, most of our businesses are small and micro businesses. The percentage of 80% globally has been thrown around, and it is equally true in Barbados. Eighty percent of the businesses in Barbados are small and micro and nano. And they operate on very slender profit margins, very slender profit margins. And they have to go and face a bank in order to raise foreign exchange because Barbados, like most of the small island developing states of the world, doesn’t have a globally traded currency. So you go and you face your banker and you try to raise that foreign exchange you need because you have to import raw materials and other inputs into your business. And you have to meet the demands of your consumer and public out there. And then something happens along the way which disrupts that supply. You still have to face that banker Monday morning. And you still have to satisfactorily respond to that consumer Monday morning. And the challenge for these people is real. And you see so many disrupting events take place and you’re forced to ask yourself, when does this end? Because even as these disrupting events take place, time after time, the reality is that it comes back to being an additional amount of pain for that entrepreneur who is trying to hold that business effort together so that he or she can feed a family and keep a few people employed. It is a task. And it is necessary at some stage for those of us in public life to recognize that little Barbados is not gonna solve this problem by itself. We may be treated by our electorate as though we are expected to solve the problem by ourselves, but we can’t. And little Tuvalu, the Seychelles, Solomon Islands, Fiji, St. Vincent, Dominica, none of us can solve this problem by ourselves. And if you pay close attention to CNN, you’ll realize that the mighty United States of America can’t solve this problem by itself. Nor, for that matter, can the United Kingdom and others. So that we settled on the view. that it is perhaps best for us to go back to the multilateral platform. That vital, and I want to submit, Secretary General, indispensable platform, though much abused, much criticized, often threatened, but an indispensable platform where we can sit and talk and try to make sense out of some of the most defiant issues which confront the global community, and the supply chain which feeds ourselves, feeds our families, keeps our businesses afloat, keeps our countries growing, and our economies wholesome. That is one of the issues which have to be confronted and wrestled to the ground. And that, ladies and gentlemen, is what gave birth to this. So we get it, and I assure you once again of our unswerving political will. It would have been a heroic expectation to believe that we would leave here with all the answers in place. But we have done something very special. We have given a voice. We have given agency and voice to the issue. And we have brought a thousand thoughts together to contend on what are clearly defined areas where we may do a little bit better, and howsoever difficult the problems may be, how can we work together? I am particularly attracted to the idea of regional chains, regional supply effort. This is something that we in CARICOM have long been talking about. It is equally frustrated because with that must come access to maritime transport because our islands, like the ones in the Pacific, are separated by the sea. We have to find a way of overcoming that distance. But it is not beyond us to find these solutions. And the important thing is that through dialogue, We have brought financiers to the table. Through dialogue, we’ve brought investors to this country to sit at the table. Through dialogue, we’ve brought insurers to the country to sit at the table. Through dialogue, we have brought all of those essential players who are component parts of this giant puzzle to operate in a meaningful and constructive manner in an effort to find solutions. And for that, and for that cooperation you’ve given us in this regard, I want too to use this opportunity to say a lot of thanks. And I begin once again with you, Secretary General. You and your team have been absolutely amazing, and I’m deeply obliged to you. There were some key outcomes. I think that the ministerial declaration that we just recognized was obviously one of them. But I would also want to mention the fact that there was a UNIDO agreement which Barbados was able to sign. And that UNIDO agreement is obviously about industrial development. Obviously it will come with an opportunity for technological transfer, better understanding and grasp of some of the logistics issues, capacity building for us as a country. But it positions Barbados yet again in this region as being that hub which will then be able to share all of this information, all of these opportunities with our neighbors in the Caribbean space. And for us that is a vitally important thing, especially as we have to reimagine industry. Because it is not only just a question of the global supply chain or regional supply chains that must be created, but it must be digitizing that which we do. It must be trading via electronic commerce. It must be placing technologically advanced systems into the hands of ordinary people in their business places and frankly in their homes. And that is something that has to be married also by training our young people in a way that makes them not only conversant with but skilled and effective with the use of modern technologies which are obviously going to include robotics and artificial intelligence and so on. It is a steep, steep climb for small states like ours, but again, I think Brother Mendoza made the point very well, it requires the political will. Above and beyond that, we had the privilege of having once again another UN-assisted endeavor, the Global Compact was launched. Perhaps we in the Caribbean are a little bit behind the eight ball on this one, but I think it is important. We had a very useful session a couple evenings ago. I believe that I should recognize the head of the private sector here, Trisha Tannis, and Trisha, I want to say to you that as usual, I take your wisdom on board. Trisha made the very important point that it is necessary for us to meet small and micro business people where they are, and that it is all well and good to say that there are ten principles which are lofty and useful ideas, and that you want to encourage their workplaces to be places where there is no exploitation of child labor, exploitation of women, that there are workplaces which are dedicated to supporting collective bargaining endeavors and the presence of the trade union, and all of those other things. It is important that we find a way to reach out to all of these business people who are preoccupied at the same time with maintaining a profit margin, and keeping people employed. It is important for us to be able to make sure we reach out to them and keep them abreast of these objectives so that they can marry the two. Ultimately, once that has been done, it makes for a more efficient, effective, and better place for a business to operate. but we have to effectively make that marriage take place. Obviously, for me, I should say now and for the government of Barbados that the message should go from this platform, that that global compact also speaks to anti-corruption. And this government has set its face like flint against corrupt practices. We have done that which has never been done in this island or quite frankly in this region in terms of the scope and scale of the anti-corruption legislation that we have passed. But as I said on that same evening that we launched the compact, we are mindful that he who bribeth is as guilty as he who receiveth. And therefore, bribes usually come from the private enterprise to the government. And we have to be equally wary about corruption in private enterprise. It is a conversation that very often, interestingly, people don’t like to have. Everyone wants to have the conversation about public administration and corruption, but very few people like to have the conversation about private enterprise and corruption. But there are parts of the world where once you have stepped over that line as a private player, there is a punishment. And in many of those cases, the punishment is an inability to get access to government contracts for a period of time. In other words, you have fouled in the penalty area, so there is a punishment to you. That is not yet the law in Barbados, but I think it must be. And I want to say to you, I think that this is something that has to happen across CARICOM because we have to make this Caribbean community a place which is transparent for doing business and is also a wholesome place for investment into the future. So in regard to that global compact launch, that is where the rubber meets the proverbial road, and we take that very seriously in all of this. in all of its ways of interpretation and execution. I want to turn my attention next to the very critical issue of saying some thank yous. I have already said to you a hundred times in this meeting, Secretary General, how valuable your presence has been, and that of your team. I should say that we just saw Shamika here, we just saw Jan Hoffman here, and I want to say to those officials, as well as to Pamela, and I believe Leanne, is it Leanne or Lizanne? Lizanne, Frida, of course, Regina, Poul, Maria, look, I may have been a little bit difficult to bear with from time to time. I know that. I said at the reception that when you labor in the name of the people, you should not be laboring in vain. I’ll tell you what perhaps you may not know. In December of last year, Mr. Carlos Wharton and my permanent secretary and a few other senior officials in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade were seated in a meeting, and I became uncomfortable. Not unhappy, but uncomfortable. And I said to them, but I need to have more concrete answers. This thing is only five months away, and you’re still telling me you hope, you expect, you think, but I am not hearing any certainty. And that just can’t fly. We’ve invited the world to our doorstep. Sometimes you have to do that, Secretary General. And the takeaway was that every single week on Wednesday morning, from that time, with the exception of Christmas week, we would have a meeting, and we would be going through all of the boxes, dotting I’s, crossing T’s. Is the protocol right? How many cars do we need? What type of security? What level of attendance? How many ministers, et cetera, et cetera. everything that you can imagine. And so I think they came to dislike the Minister of Foreign Affairs a little bit. I hope now, however, that we’ve seen this spectacular success, that they’ll come to appreciate that he wasn’t just being grumpy bear, he was really trying his best to make sure we could execute this successfully. But I do equally want to thank not only the UNCTAD side, but my side. P.S. Foreign Affairs, you’re here, please stand and be acknowledged. You have led a wonderful team, ma’am. And seated next to her is Lisa Lane, our Chief of Protocol. Lisa, please stand and be acknowledged. Thank you. And equally, let me thank not only the Chief of Protocol, but her team, because it could not only be done by her. And sitting next to her is the said Mr. Carlos Wharton, who has been heroic in his efforts. Carlos, please stand and be equally acknowledged. Thank you. And with Carlos, there was also, obviously, a National Implementation Unit, which would have been including Deirdre Holder and Jacqueline Griffith. I see some of you know these names by heart. And Natalie Dial. I do not want, and this is the very dangerous part of this type of exercise, because you can bring a lot of ill will to yourself once you start calling names and accidentally leave out somebody. So for the avoidance of doubt, all who were involved, the Minister offers you his thanks and his gratitude. Thank you. I feel, ladies and gentlemen, that I should say that we were here in Barbados. We were using our technology to reach out to Jan and sometimes I frustrated Jan too, I have no doubt, on those Wednesday morning meetings. And Jan, thank you for your patience in that regard. But he consistently said to me, Minister, you know, we have this. We’ve done this, we’ve done this type of thing before. But there was a bridge, and that bridge came in the form of the Geneva team from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, led by Ambassador Wilson. And I do not know if Matthew’s in the room, but Matthew, I want to, where is he? Oh, there you are, yeah. And Matthew, please send my regards to Geneva for the entirety of the team, and accept my regards and thanks right now. Ladies and gentlemen, there’s obviously a need for me to recognize those people who financed and helped make some of this happen. There are a number of agencies, including the Inter-American Development Bank, the Caribbean Development Bank, the Port Authority of Saudi Arabia. There are those who lent assistance, for example, the World Trade Organization. We have in Barbados those entities which are Barbadian, like Export Barbados and Invest Barbados, who played a crucial role as well. We have had the assistance of our National Cultural Foundation. That reception that you would have been invited to on Tuesday evening, that was the work of the National Cultural Foundation. I think that all of you have seen and experienced firsthand the magic of the Barbados Tourism Marketing Incorporated. And I really want to give them a special, give them a round of applause. They, I keep saying, they manage, I think, the most competitive, if not the very best tourism product to be found in the world. I had already said Invest Barbados. The Caribbean Private Sector Organization has had an input into this and I want to thank them for that too. And of course in Barbados we do a lot by also involving our small and micro business enterprises. The Prime Minister had a brainchild of creating a Barbados Trust Fund, which is essentially an enterprise that does exactly what it sounds like. We begin by saying to a young entrepreneur, or sometimes an old entrepreneur, we’re simply going to have trust in you. You want to start a business, let’s forget about all the red tape, here is $5,000. You have an idea, we will meet you, we will work with you, we will try to implement and we will hold your hand and navigate you through all the challenges which micro businesses face. Come into the office with regularity, let us have a look at how you’re performing, we can attach a consultant to you so you get to better understand the regulatory environment within which you operate. But they have done that, they began that in 2018 and I think that today it would be true to say that we have over 30,000 clients in the Barbados Trust Fund, some of whom are now exporting into the region and beyond. So they are good people doing good work. I was trying to remember just now, it is modelled off of the Grameen Bank in one of the Pacific countries. There is also the international or regional entities like CARICOM, the OECS, UWI, ladies and gentlemen, really too much to mention all of them, but it would be remiss of me to leave this place without saying to those people who give of their time as volunteers and those people who have been working with you as liaison officers how very indebted I am and how very indebted the team is because it’s all well and good but there are people who had to be met, who had to be escorted, who had to be assisted in one form or another. That is the nature of these global-sized conferences and to manage the expectations of over 900 delegates is a challenge. a tall task. I think from all I’m hearing is that they have done that very satisfactorily. So I offer my thanks to them. And last but by no means least, you would have been protected by the police while you were here. You would have been protected by the defense force while you were here. Very inconspicuously, they’ve been among you. And equally, if in the event that anything happened of a medical nature, we had a whole fleet of ambulance and quick response people out there. You can’t have the secretary general coming here and being overwhelmed by all the good things of Barbados and passing out and not have an ambulance for her. So that we have, we paid attention to detail at every level. And for all of those people in the essential services, I want to thank them for their role in helping to pull this off. And last, the people who managed this conference center. This conference center was created so that we could do SIDS 1, out of which came the Barbados program of action. We are now going to Antigua to do SIDS 4. This conference center has been here as a consequence of that and has now lived to see an equally important event take place. And I once again want to say a simple thank you. I’m being signaled, but I’m not understanding what I’m signaled to say. You’re free. Forget the protocol, tell me. Oh, okay, very important. I forgot the interpreters, without whom, without whom we would not have been able to speak to each other in the other languages. You see the danger of starting to give thanks. You get yourself into trouble. Very grateful to you, Carlos. But I was simply saying, by way of wrapping up, that this conference hall has been able to. to live now or exist to see an equally important undertaking take place. And ladies and gentlemen, Barbados is touched by your presence. We feel that this is but a first step, but it is a vital step in helping to do one thing that is essential, bring down the cost of living and make businesses more effective in all the countries of the world. And to the extent that we’ve been able to do this, I want to thank you very much. Now it is 10 minutes to one on Friday in Barbados and you are on an amazing island, an amazing tourism destination. I know that some of you are going to the second best one in the Caribbean for the SIDS conference, but I want to urge you to make the most of this evening and tonight and if you’re going to spend the weekend in Barbados, the most of the weekend. I’m not going to list for you the innumerable activities that you can do tonight, but I’m sure I will see a lot of you in oysters later on. See all the heads nodding, so it’s clear that you may have to have some tour buses to get them all there. But ladies and gentlemen, please enjoy the other half of what this conference should be about. You’ve come a long way to the Caribbean, soak it up for all it is worth and remember rum, rum and more rum. Travel safely.

Belle Holder:
Ladies and gentlemen, the Minister of Foreign Affairs and Foreign Trade, the Honourable Kerrie Symmonds. On that wonderful note, Minister, of course, Minister acknowledge the different languages and the interpreters that were here today. But I also wanted to point out an individual. This is something that’s actually really important to the Prime Minister of Barbados. and that is equal access for all. And here at the Global Supply Chain Forum, through the National Implementation Unit, we actually have our assigned designated photographer, who is deaf. So when you guys are having all these wonderful conversations, he’s like, okay. And I don’t speak any sign languages, but we make it work. So by your round of applause now, I want Scott to be able to understand what’s going on. Scott. Scott. Scott Williams, ladies and gentlemen. You. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. Another thing that Minister Symmonds pointed out is the BTMI, the Barbados Tourism Marketing Inc, has done an amazing job, of course, of marketing Destination Barbados. And as the Minister said, rum, okay? And we want you to come back to Barbados. A wonderful time to come back to Barbados, of course, would be for our Crop Over Festival, which, if you’re gonna book, so you need to book now, come back late, the last week of July, into the first Monday in August. But we also want you to come back in October for the Barbados Food and Rum Festival. Take a look, ladies and gentlemen. All right, ladies and gentlemen, that’s all the reasons right there that we need to protect our CIS. Beautiful, happy, smiling people who we want to keep safe and happy. So will I see you in Barbados in October? Will I see you in Barbados in October? Ladies and gentlemen, what a wonderful occasion this has been. And we know that the hard work continues now that the curtain has come down on the Global Supply Chain Forum for 2024. My name is Bell Holder. It was my absolute pleasure to serve you, ladies and gentlemen. Thank you so much. Be safe. Enjoy the island tonight.