The 72nd World Health Assembly (WHA) was held in Geneva, Switzerland last month, May 2019 and the delegates adopted three resolutions relating to Universal Health Coverage (UHC). The resolutions are expected to be acted upon by delegates when they return home, since these are the recommended approaches to strengthen our health systems and provide quality health coverage for the entire population. These resolutions require member states to implement recommendations agreed upon in 2018, which would strengthen Primary Health Care (PHC) to “have quality, integrated health systems and empowered individuals and communities”. It also suggests that attention be placed on Community Health Workers, who should be in the frontline of delivering PHC. The resolutions supported the organizing of a High-Level Meeting at the United Nations in New York during September 2019 to discuss Universal Health Coverage and finally the resolutions asked Member States to “accelerate progress towards universal health coverage with a focus on poor, vulnerable and marginalized individuals and groups”.
When countries have oil and gas resources, they typically sign Production Sharing Agreements (“PSA”) with foreign oil companies (in this article called “FOC”) for exploration and development of those resources. There are certain basic characteristics in PSAs, that ensure that the country with the oil and gas resource and the FOC mutually benefit from the relationship. The PSA that our Government signed with GPG on 31st March 2008 departed significantly from these basic characteristics, so that it was heavily one-sided in favour of GPG.
This time of year is always an important one for students through-out the country.The primary school children have just completed the Caribbean Primary Exit Assessment (CPEA) exams.The CSEC (CXC) and Caribbean Advanced Proficiency Examinations (CAPE) are also now underway and the National Democratic Congress (NDC) wishes all students success as they prepare for and sit these exams.
Between 25th April and 8th May 2019, a housekeeping mission comprising representatives from: the IMF, the World Bank, the Caribbean Development Bank and the Eastern Caribbean Central visited Grenada and held meetings with key interest groups including Government, the NDC as the main opposition party, trade unions, private sector and civil society organisations.
In the first part of this article, we indicated that the Production Sharing Agreement (“PSA”) between the Government of Grenada (“GOG”) and GPG dated March 31st 2008, for the“exploration, development and production of offshore petroleum resources of Grenada”,was for an initial period of 4 years and was manifestly disadvantageous to Grenada.
